


Runaway

by Maculategiraffe



Series: How Life Goes On, The Way It Does [4]
Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: ALL THE SPOILERS, Brotherly Love, Coursers need love too, Dancing, Established Relationship, F/M, Family Bonding, Far Harbor, First Kiss, Gen, Just one big lovefest, Motherhood, Motherly love, Nobody goes to far harbor, One millionth kiss, Other, Post-Main Storyline, Sisterly Love, SoSu Moms Out All Over the Place, Spoilers, all the hugs, but i promise nothing, canon divergent for the DLC specifically, far harbor dlc, filial affection, not for the main storyline, not really very many spoilers for far harbor actually, stepfatherly love, until next time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-19
Updated: 2016-08-02
Packaged: 2018-07-11 19:00:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 30,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7066225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maculategiraffe/pseuds/Maculategiraffe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nora and her new family work to make the Commonwealth a better place.  And maybe try to get people to stop leaving it all the dang time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Going Publick

The Vault Dweller’s Daughter

by Piper Wright

 

If you live in the Commonwealth, you’ve probably heard the name Nora Bowman. She might even have saved your life a time or two. She’s the general of the Minutemen, the volunteer militia that protects so many of our towns and settlements from attack, and when she’s not out and about killing feral ghouls, super mutants, raiders, and Gunners to protect the innocent, she lives at Minuteman headquarters in Fort Independence.

So does her adopted daughter, Emily, an Institute-created synth once known as Unit Y4-15.

Most of us can barely remember a time when synths weren’t a threat, when we didn’t have to fear that our loved ones might be dead, replaced by a synth duplicate, or that any stranger on the street might be a secret spy for the Institute. Residents of Diamond City are still reeling from the revelation that our longtime mayor had been replaced by a synth-- one Bowman killed in order to keep the city safe. But with the Institute gone (something else Bowman is responsible for), some synths find themselves stranded, isolated, and afraid.

“When I first met my mother,” says Emily, “I was sure that if she found out what I really was, she would hate me. I felt so scared and guilty all the time. When I realized it was going to be all right, I--” Tears come to her eyes at the memory. Bowman, beside her, takes her hand.

Many synths, according to my sources inside the Railroad, have had their memories altered so they’re no longer even aware they aren’t human. Emily says she can understand why others might make that choice. “Because that way you aren’t scared all the time, the way you are if you know, and if there isn’t anybody you can trust enough to tell. Except that if you do find out, or someone else does, it must be even worse-- even scarier-- when you realize you’re something not even you understand.”

How many of us lost loved ones to the Institute and don’t even know it yet? Emily doesn’t know either-- apparently, the Institute didn’t keep its slaves that well-informed-- but she doesn’t believe it’s fair to blame the synths who may have been created to replace them.

“We didn’t make ourselves,” she says. “If the Institute took someone from you, that’s awful, and I’m sorry, but-- the Institute’s gone. If you’re looking for revenge, or to make sure it doesn’t happen again--” She looks at Bowman. “That’s been taken care of.”

With the Institute gone for more than a year, we all-- humans, and the synths who remain among us-- need to move forward. Nora Bowman has chosen to do so by helping those who need help, and Emily, who is already enrolled with the Minutemen, plans to follow her example. Maybe that isn’t a bad plan for the rest of us, either. 

“Please,” says Emily, when asked for any final message for my readers, “if you’re a human-- no matter how scared you are, please know we’re scared too, and we hope--”

She hesitates. She looks down at her hand, clasped in her mother’s. 

“We hope.”


	2. I got the green light, I got a little fight, I'm gonna turn this thing around

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [The Killers, "Read My Mind"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zc8hbSM1zVo)

I was checking on the mutfruit bushes at Starlight Drive-In-- they seemed to be growing well-- and Hancock was off chatting to some settler who recognized him from Goodneighbor, when another settler straightened up from his work and came over to me. I knew him slightly; his name was Doug, and he’d approached me the first time I visited after he moved in, to thank me for the opportunity and ask if there was anything he could do to help out. 

Now he said, “We’ve been reading about you.”

I had a pretty good idea what he probably meant, but I waited. 

“Caravaner brought by that paper,” he said. “The Diamond City paper? Publick Occurrences?”

“Which one?” I asked, because there were a few different issues floating around that mentioned me, and it wasn’t like everybody got the new edition delivered to their doorstep every morning. Issues that made their way to a settlement, via caravan or provisioner or newcomer, tended to get passed around and read to tatters, since the Commonwealth was fairly short on new reading material these days, and I sometimes arrived at a settlement to find it abuzz with talk about “View from the Vault,” the interview I’d given Piper back when we first met.

He cleared his throat. “The one about your, uh, daughter.”

“Ah, yeah,” I said neutrally. “The latest issue."

“Right,” he said. “So-- here’s the thing.”

I thought he was going to tell me he couldn’t live in a settlement associated with the now openly synth-sympathizing Minutemen, and I was ready to shrug and wish him good luck out there, but instead he said, “I’ve never told anybody. My wife-- I mean, his wife-- she got killed by super mutants-- I never told her, she died not knowing--”

I could see now that under the usual dust and grime of a settler’s workday, his face was pale.

“Oh,” I said, and reached out, and took his hand in mine. “Hey. OK.”

His hand tightened on mine; his hazel eyes were fixed on my face. A couple of settlers were looking at us curiously. I drew him off further from the crops, toward the workbench. 

“It’s all right,” I said quietly, “but let go of my hand now.”

He loosened his grip, and we dropped our arms to our sides and stood facing each other, close together.

“You should know,” he said. “I-- I killed the, the original Doug.”

I nodded. I didn’t know what to say.

“I thought about-- running away,” he said. “Once I was on the surface. But I didn’t know where to go, except-- the place I was supposed to go. So I went there, and when I found him-- when he saw me-- he, he pulled out a gun, and-- I did, I did what I was supposed to.”

I nodded again, feeling sick. Every time I came up against something like this, hard evidence of the Institute’s policies-- policies my _son_ had perpetuated and enforced-- my Shaun--

“Are you going to kill me?” he asked.

“No,” I said, shocked. “God, no. Of course not.”

“It said you killed the McDonogh unit,” he said. “I wasn’t sure--”

I winced. Piper had wanted to mention my heroic slaying of Not-McDonogh to make the point that I didn’t indiscriminately support synths against humans, but--

“That was different,” I said. “He’d just shot an innocent and taken a hostage-- and when I tried to talk him down, he started shooting at me and Hancock. You start shooting at me, or random settlers, we’ll have a problem.”

“But he _was_ just a random settler,” he said. “Doug. The real Doug.”

“Doug,” I said. “I’m not conducting a federal investigation here. You came to me-- and I’m glad you did, I’m glad you told me. That was really brave.”

“I’ve never told _anyone_ ,” he said again. “Not even-- Anna.”

My question must have been on my face; he said, somehow eager, “I was so scared-- to go to his wife, and pretend to be him. But she-- she _liked_ me. Whenever I’d do something nice-- fix her a drink, or tell her to take a break from working, or say something nice, how pretty she was-- she was so pretty-- but she always acted so surprised. Happy, but surprised. She’d say, what’s come over you, Doug, why are you being so sweet like this? I thought-- sometimes-- I’d tell her-- but I didn’t want her to be sad, or, or, confused. I think I-- I think maybe I loved her. I think maybe she loved me too. If you can love somebody when you don’t even know what they really are. Do you think you can?” 

“I don’t know,” I said. “I-- yeah, I guess I do."

“She died not knowing,” he said again. “I tried to protect her, but she was so brave, she went running out shooting and I was, I was too late--”

“I’m so sorry,” I said, pain wrenching me from belly to throat. My Nate had died bravely, too, on a cry of defiance, _I’m not giving you Shaun_ , while I battered my knuckles bloody on the glass between us. “Listen. What can I do for you?”

He watched me without answering.

I said, “Do you want to come live with me at the Castle? Fort Independence? You’d be safe there.”

“I-- I mean, thank you,” he said, in a tone that meant _no_. “That’s very-- very kind.” He was watching me closely, presumably for any flicker of hot anger or cold rejection; Emily had watched me, once, the same way, although I hadn’t understood at the time. X9-21 still had that watchful quality, around me and around the Institute humans, too, although he smiled back at me more these days, when I smiled at him.

“Just an offer,” I said lightly. I was getting better at dealing with sudden-onset empty-nest syndrome, especially since my nest wasn’t actually very empty anymore. “In case you felt like you needed protection. Or a place where you could be open about your-- self.”

“That’s the thing,” he said, quietly, but somehow eagerly. “Everybody here’s been reading that paper, that interview with Y4-15-- Emily-- and talking about it. And I was kind of wondering, if I-- if I told them--”

“Oh,” I said, when he trailed off. “Well. You think-- I mean, you know them better than I do, you’ve been hearing what they’ve been saying. You think it’s safe?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “I mean-- what do you think?”

I considered. He’d gone all this time assuming anyone who found out would kill him-- and he’d probably been right-- but if they’d been reading the interview and talking about it (and no one had gotten up in my face about it yet), and he’d been listening and thinking--

“If you do it now,” I said finally. “With me and Hancock here-- I don’t think anybody’s going to pull a gun on us just to get to you. I guess it’s possible, but I’m thinking the main risk is that they decide they’re not all right with having you here, and I need to find you somewhere else to live. You OK with that? Taking that risk?”

Slowly, he nodded.

“Is there one person you’d rather tell first,” I asked, “or do you want it to be everybody at once?”

“There’s-- no one person,” he said. 

“Then you want to head over to the bell?”

“Wait,” he said. “I-- what should I say? How should I start?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I guess-- ‘I have something to tell you all’?”

“Right,” he said. “OK. I-- you’ll-- stand with me? In front of them?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I will.”

When he was ready, I rang the bell, and he gave a little speech-- halting, stammering, but that was probably for the best, since the idea of a sinister smooth-talking master of deception was one of the scarier ideas floating around about synths. He admitted to killing the original Doug, which I thought was pretty brave, and probably a good idea, since that would be an inevitable question. Better to deal with it right up front.

Everybody listened, watching Doug-- and sometimes me-- until he’d finished. Then there was a silence. 

Then one woman said, “OK,” in a matter-of-fact voice, and a few people nodded.

“Are we good?” I asked them. “Anybody have any questions for Doug? Or for me?”

“Yeah,” said a man. “I got questions for Doug. Why did the Institute have this guy-- the real Doug-- replaced? What were you doing for them? Did you get us attacked?”

I looked at Doug, who’d reddened. 

“I wasn’t assigned here,” he said. “The place I was originally sent, it doesn’t exist any more. Super mutants wiped us out. But it wasn’t my fault. I mean-- yeah, I was supposed to-- sabotage. Breaking water purifiers, disabling turrets, that kind of thing. But I didn’t ever-- actually do anything.” He gave a faint, grimacing smile. “I figured if anybody ever showed up-- from the Institute-- and asked for a report, I’d lie, so I wouldn’t be decommissioned. But I mean-- I lived there too. My friends lived there. My-- my wife.”

Nobody actually said, _You mean_ his _wife_.

“Other questions?” I asked, and a few people looked at each other, then back at me. “Are you sure? Because if you guys aren’t good with him being here, he can come with me when I leave, no hard feelings. But if he stays here and then I come back and he’s mysteriously missing, _I’m_ going to have a lot of questions.”

“We’re good,” said the first woman who’d spoken, meeting my eyes, and then turned to Doug. “We still call you Doug? The Institute gives you numbers, right?”

“I’d prefer Doug,” he said, and she nodded. 

“I guess I would too, if it was me,” she said. “Hey, Nora. You give our best to your family, yeah?”

“I will,” I said. “Thanks.”

………………………………………………………………..

“I’m not gonna say I told you so,” said Hancock, as we left, “but I feel like _somebody_ told you it was a good idea to let Piper do a piece on Emily.”

“Yeah, yeah,” I said. “Don’t get too smug. There’s still time for everything to go horribly wrong.”

“You never give the people enough credit,” said Hancock. “Give decent folks a chance, and they’ll do the decent thing.”

“That’s a nice thought,” I said, “but I’ve seen plenty of decent people do hideous things because they were confused, or they’d been lied to, and they thought they were doing right.”

“That’s why you tell the truth and unconfuse ‘em,” said Hancock. “Where to now?”

“Uh, while we’re out here, I’ve been meaning to check in with Blake Abernathy,” I said. “Make sure those raiders haven’t moved back into Station Olivia. Last time I was out here Lucy said--”

“General?” said Matthew’s voice from my Pip-Boy, and I screeched to a halt as Hancock swore softly under his breath. “Requesting you return to the Castle when possible. There’s no threat, just a situation that could use your input.” There was a pause-- I could hear voices in the background, and Matthew resumed, with a smile in his voice, “It’s a good situation.”

“A good situation?” I said, when the violins had resumed.

“I dunno,” said Hancock, “but I’m gonna guess the Abernathys can wait.”

I was walking fast, east. “Why didn’t I think to steal the Institute’s secret teleportation technology before I exploded it?”

“Enh,” said Hancock. “Every time I watched you turn into blue lightning and disappear, I got a little bit antsy until you turned back into the usual hot stuff. Pace yourself, Nora. It’s a good situation.”

“All the more reason to get there fast,” I said, but I slowed down, a little. 

……………………………………….

As we approached the Castle, Hancock said, “Who the hell--”

I saw them a second later: two people at the counter in the abandoned diner, sitting side by side, heads close together, talking. That was odd. Most people didn’t just hang out in abandoned buildings when there was a fortress nearby-- whether that fortress would have sheltered them or attacked them on approach. 

It was a man and a woman; they both looked up at the sound of Hancock’s and my footsteps, and Deacon’s trademark sunglasses and Emily’s red hair both caught the sunlight and gleamed.

“What’s that fuckin’ asshole doing here?” Hancock asked. He’d never liked Deacon, but he hadn’t ever sounded quite as mad at him as he did right now; I wondered, amused, if it was because he was sitting so close to Emily.

“We’re about to find out,” I said. Emily was already walking out the door to meet me; she didn’t run, but she walked quickly, into my arms, and I hugged her tightly.

I didn’t say _What are you doing out here_ or _You should stay inside where it’s safe_ ; I said, “Hey, sweetheart. What’s up?”

“Mother,” she said, eyes alight, “there are two new people here. Inside the walls. They both read what Ms. Wright wrote in the paper, and they want to talk to you.”

“OK,” I said cautiously. “In a good way?”

Emily nodded, beaming. “One of them is definitely a synth, and the other one says she thinks she’s one too, but she’s not sure.”

“Oh, my God,” I said. “Oh, wow. Sweetheart, that’s amazing. They’re here to-- to stay?”

“One is,” said Emily, as Deacon came up beside her. “Well, he wants to. I don’t think he quite believes me that you’ll want him to, but he’ll believe _you_. The other one, she just-- I’m not sure. She says she’s looking for answers.”

“Hopefully ones I have,” I said, and turned to Deacon. "Hi."

"Ahem," said Deacon. "It was incredibly irresponsible of you to publicize Emily’s location across the Commonwealth. Don’t you know the kind of repercussions your recklessness could create. Just when the Commonwealth was becoming less paranoid, beginning to forget about the possibility of synths living among us, you had to re-ignite the flames--”

“Hey, you know who in the Commonwealth hadn’t forgotten about the possibility of synths living among us?” I said. “Synths living among us.”

“Shh,” said Deacon. “I’ll forget my lines. You had to re-ignite the flames-- uh, something about an angry mob with torches and pitchforks… dammit, now I can’t remember. It was a really striking image, too.”

“Best of luck to anyone who attacks the Castle with torches and pitchforks,” I said. “We get raiders with missile launchers, sometimes. I pick them up off their corpses and melt them down for scrap, because I already have so many missile launchers. Anything else?”

Emily giggled, and Deacon glanced sideways at her, smiling.

“Nah, that was it,” he said. “She was gonna wait to yell at you until the next time you came by, but I was going to be in the neighborhood anyway, so I volunteered to deliver the lecture.”

“What a stand-up guy,” said Hancock irritably, and Deacon said, “Yeah, well, I'm worried your lady friend's going to start associating Railroad HQ with getting yelled at. Shame if you two stopped coming by to brighten our lives." He held up a hand as I opened my mouth to speak. "I know, why don't we move back aboveground, that basement's so depressing, the Institute threat is gone-- I've got that lecture memorized too. I'll take it back to Des if you want."

"What I want to know is why you're hanging out in abandoned buildings with my-- my girlfriend's daughter," said Hancock. 

Deacon raised an eyebrow. "Well, I was just gonna wait out here, not bother your soldier types. But then the welcoming committee arrived.”

I looked at Emily, and she said, “I thought maybe he was another synth, and he was scared to come in, so I came out to tell him it was all right.”

“Alone?” I asked. I couldn’t help it. If it hadn’t been Deacon out here-- if it had been an ambush, Desdemona’s hypothetical angry mob luring Emily out to make some kind of sick example of her--

“No,” she said, smiling at me. “Deanna and James came with me. But they recognized him, and he said he was waiting for you, and I said I’d wait with him. I knew you’d be home soon. And you’ve told me so much about him.”

The smile slipped off Deacon’s face for a second; when it came back, it was stiffer and more artificial than before.

“Of course she has,” he said, with a brittle brightness. “She probably tells you everything, right?”

“I don’t know about _everything_ ,” said Emily. “But enough that I wasn’t worried about being alone out here with you. Mother, shouldn’t we get inside?”

“Yes, we should,” I said. “You coming, Deacon?” 

“Sure,” said Deacon, and met my eyes for a moment, without the fake smile. “Thanks.”

As the four of us walked back into the Castle, I scanned for strangers, and saw one: a young Asian woman in a mechanic’s jumpsuit, examining the radio transmitter in the center of the courtyard.

“Where’s the other one?” I asked, and Emily said, “I’m not sure. I’ll go look for him. You want to talk to them both right away, don’t you?”

“Of course,” I said, as Matthew said something to the girl and she looked up, at me and Emily and Hancock and Deacon, her brow furrowed. She looked about the same age Emily did-- eighteen or twenty, maybe.

“I’ll go find G7-95,” said Emily. “You go say hi to Kasumi.”


	3. and here's the party it turned into

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [New Pornographers, "Mutiny, I Promise You"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-g8J3pcmGY)

“Hi,” I said, when I was close enough. “I’m Nora. Kasumi, right?”

“I guess so,” she said, glancing from me to Hancock to Deacon curiously, and flashed a small, hesitant smile. “I’m not really sure any more.”

I nodded. “Emily says you think you might be a synth?”

“I think so,” she said. “I mean-- I was hoping she could help me figure it out, and we’ve been talking, but so far things are still kind of inconclusive.”

I looked at Deacon, who said, “What makes you think you’re a synth?”

“I’m sorry,” said Kasumi, “who are you?”

“Oh, sorry,” I said. “This is Deacon, he’s with the Railroad.”

“Yell it a little louder, why don’t you?” said Deacon. 

“Sorry,” I said. “What I meant is, _I’m_ with the Railroad. Codename Bullseye.”

Deacon said, “We call her that because of how she likes to walk around with a giant target on her ass at all times.”

”Don’t be a dick, Deacon,” I said. 

“As the scorpion said to the frog, it’s my nature," he said. "But not in a scary stingy drowny way, more in a constant jokes and sarcasm that make you want to drown _yourself_ way. So yeah, Kasumi, I might be able to oh holy mother of--”

Startled, I turned and followed his gaze to one of the doorways to the interior of the Castle; X9-21 was walking towards us, and Shaun, from the same direction, was running.

“What?” I asked, and Deacon said quietly, “The courser. I knew you had one here, I just-- I’ve seen that one before.”

“Oh,” I said, trying not to imagine under what circumstances Deacon would have run into X9-21 before. “I-- look, he’s with us now. Please be cool,” I added very quickly, just before Shaun barrelled into me, almost knocking me down. 

“You’re home!” he yelled. “You brought Deacon!”

“Hey there, 2.0,” said Deacon, his voice reasonably steady, and held out a palm to Shaun. “Gimme five.”

Shaun smacked his hand, and said to me, “Mom, I’ve been working with Dr. Achanta in the lab with the soil samples and that high-powered microscope you brought me and the different kinds of water and some of the seedlings are growing so fast, if you show everybody how to use our techniques Dr. Achanta says you might be able to increase crop yield threefold, you have to come see--”

“Baby, that’s so great,” I said. “I’ll come look in just a minute, OK?”

X9-21 had halted a couple of yards from us, standing straight and still. I was learning to read him better, and I was pretty sure this particular variety of stillness, combined with the slight distance at which he’d stopped and the utter deadpan of his face, meant he was unhappy or uncertain about something. 

“X9-21,” I said, “this is my friend Deacon.”

“Hello, sir,” said X9-21, in his usual neutral tone.

After a few moments, Deacon managed a weak “Hi.”

“Hey,” I said, “Deacon, why don’t you and Kasumi head over to the rec room-- I’m sure you’ve got some information she’d find useful. I’ll meet you guys in there in a little bit with Emily and the other new guy, and we can all talk and figure out next steps. Shaun, why don’t you take Hancock to see the plants in the lab, and I’ll be right in to see them too, OK?”

“OK!” said Shaun enthusiastically, and grabbed Hancock’s hand, pulling him towards the doorway.

“Yeah, can’t wait to check out those seedlings,” said Hancock, rolling his eyes at me over his shoulder, while Deacon and Kasumi moved off slowly towards another doorway. I grimaced apologetically before turning to X9, who was still standing motionless, face blank.

“Anything to report, X9-21?” I asked. I’d already determined that asking him if he was all right just got me a rundown of his physical condition, and asking if there was anything he wanted to talk about always resulted in a cool “no, ma’am.” 

“No, ma’am,” he said anyway, but he added, “Emily has presumably given you a report already, since she chose to wait for you outside the protection of these walls, alone with your friend Deacon.”

“Right,” I said. “Were you--” I stopped myself before saying _worried_ ; I knew he’d take exception. It wasn’t that he wouldn’t admit to having emotions; he just considered it-- uncouth, maybe-- when I drew attention to them. “Did you think she was at risk?”

“I was uncertain whether it was my duty to accompany her outside, in order to protect her,” he said. “I’m aware that her safety is a high priority for you. But with strangers inside the Castle-- I have standing instructions from Dr. Achanta to guard Naveena, and Shaun’s safety is a priority for you as well.”

“It is,” I agreed. “And so is Tanvi’s peace of mind-- and I know she always feels better when you’re with her and Naveena. I’m not mad at you, X9. Emily’s fine. And even if she weren’t, it wouldn’t be your fault.”

“If she submitted to _any_ authority other than yours,” said X9-21, “it would be easier for me to protect her.”

“She doesn’t even submit to my authority,” I said. “She just usually does as I ask, because she loves me, and she knows I love her and and want what’s best for her.” 

X9 tilted his head slightly, a barely-there nod of acknowledgement. “Practically, the distinction is unimportant.”

“Not completely unimportant,” I said, “because you can’t hold my authority over her head, because she could argue I’ve never actually ordered her not to leave the bounds of the Castle without me, which I haven’t and I won’t-- but you _could_ point out to her, if she’s doing something risky, that if she got herself killed I would collapse from grief and anguish, and ask her to spare me that. I did that once, when she was being really stubborn, and it worked great. But save it for the really important stuff, or it’ll lose its impact. And don’t tell her I told you.”

He smiled a little at that, and I thought he’d relaxed his soldier-at-attention stance a bit, too. I smiled back and held out my arms. 

“Bring it in, X9,” I said. 

He stepped forward, and we hugged. He was getting better at hugging-- he didn’t try to get his arms underneath mine any more, and he didn’t act like I was a delicate vase he was going to shatter if he actually applied any pressure. 

(The first time I’d come home from an absence-- bearing in mind our super-awkward first hug-- I’d asked him if he _minded_ being hugged, and he’d said no ma’am. I’d asked if he’d tell me if he did mind, and he’d paused for awhile, considering, and then said, “I would tell you that it didn’t cause me any physical discomfort.” And then he’d given me a crooked little smile, and looked away. It was a good thing he was a tough, musclebound guy, or my hug after that might have cracked a rib.)

“Here she comes, with G7-95,” he said when we’d both stepped back, and I turned to see Emily coming down from the wall with a youngish-looking black man in road leathers. “I’m glad you’re home, ma’am. He seems uncomfortable in my presence. I think he’s been hiding from me.”

“Ah,” I said. “Well, in all fairness, you are a little intimidating. If I were a runaway synth--”

“He’s _not_ a runaway,” said X9-21. “He was on assignment on the surface when the Institute was destroyed. Even if I were still employed in my former capacity, he would have no reason to fear me.”

“Oh, come on,” I said. “All the synths I ever saw in the Institute were petrified of you guys. Even the well-behaved ones.”

X9 frowned. “If they’d done nothing wrong, they had nothing to fear.”

“Yeah, well, I guess they’d all been having really wicked thoughts,” I said, as Emily and the other stranger came up to us.

“Hi,” I said, smiling at him. He was a handsome young man, with skin the color of baking chocolate, big dark eyes, and a shaved head. The fine fuzz of hair-stubble that was showing was stark white, as if with age. “I’m Nora.”

“G7-95, ma’am,” he said nervously.

“Is that what you want me to call you?” I asked. “Or do you have a name? Either way’s fine. So far I’ve got a Shaun, an Emily, and an X9-21. I’d like to avoid repetition if possible, but if you’re really attached to one of those names we can figure something out.”

He smiled faintly, and said, “I-- I’ve been going by Max.”

“OK, Max,” I said. Emily was giving me an encouraging look, and I remembered her saying _He doesn’t believe me, but he’ll believe you._ “Well. This is-- this place is your home, all right? You can stay as long as you want-- forever-- or leave whenever you want, but you’re always going to be welcome here. It’s safe, and there’s plenty of food and clean water, and you don’t have to ask me for anything you need-- it’s all already yours, all right? Everything I have.”

He stared at me for a moment, and then looked at Emily, who said, “I _told_ you.”

“Try not to give Ms. Bowman cause to regret her generosity,” said X9-21.

I turned to squint at him. “See, stuff like that? That’s why synths are nervous around you.”

“I’m offering friendly advice,” said X9. 

“Where’s Kasumi?” Emily asked. 

“I sent her into the rec room to talk things over with Deacon,” I said. “I figured he might have some useful input into her situation. You want to head in there too, so we can all figure out next steps? I’ll join you guys in just a sec-- I have to go ooh and aah at Shaun’s seedlings for a few minutes.”

 

…………………………………………………..

 

In the makeshift lab we’d set up in the alcove where we’d originally held X9 prisoner, Tanvi, Shaun, and Hancock were at a worktable, looking at six bowls of dirt and four of water, two microscopes, a biometric scanner, and a tray of mutfruit seeds. Beau was sitting in an armchair in the corner of the lab, reading to Naveena from an old Grognak comic book of Shaun’s, as she babbled softly and reached out for the brightly colored pictures. 

“Hey, guys,” I said. “Heard we’d been making some major breakthroughs.”

“Nora,” said Tanvi, “Shaun’s estimates are extremely optimistic.”

“Yeah, they tend to be,” I said, winking at her. “No pressure. It’ll be great if you can get our productivity up, but we’re not going to starve, either way.”

“I wish it were possible to make more concrete promises,” she said. “I feel like an idler. Consuming your resources without contributing.”

“You’re contributing plenty,” I said. “You’re teaching my kid how to science, for one thing. And-- I don’t know that much about science, beyond the basic observation, question, hypothesis stuff, but I’m pretty sure the timeframe on it isn’t that predictable in general. Everybody knows you’re working hard. We’re lucky to have you. All of you.”

She smiled. “Thank you.”

“ _Mom_ ,” said Shaun, and I moved over to the table to look at some green shoots and some slightly taller green shoots.

 

………………………………………………….

“All right,” I said, walking into the rec room-- which had once been the boardroom or the war room or something super official involving maps on the walls. I'd left X9-21 where he was most comfortable-- with Naveena and Shaun both in his sightlines-- and told Hancock he didn’t have to come hang out with Deacon if he didn’t want to. “I’m here. What do we know?”

“I know all kinds of things,” said Deacon, who was lounging against the wall. Emily, Kasumi, and Max were all on the couch, Emily in the middle. I sat down in an easy chair, with an involuntary sigh as the weight left my feet-- I hadn’t been off them since arriving home-- and Deacon straightened up and started pacing. Or not pacing exactly; meandering in a leisurely back-and-forth way. He’d always had trouble sitting still. 

“OK,” he said, “so Kasumi’s been having weird recurring dreams and memory gaps and glitchy feelings in general. She thought she might be a ringer-- a kill-and-replace, like McDonogh-- but Emily asked your courser, and he says the Institute didn’t do sleeper agents. If she was an Institute plant, she’d know what she was.”

“Unless--” Kasumi began.

“Look, kid,” said Deacon, “I’m telling you, if you freaked out and ran away from your Kasumi Nakano posting and contacted the Railroad, and we did a memory mod, we wouldn’t have placed you _back_ with the Nakanos, because then when an Institute agent showed up and asked you for a report and you said _wha-huh?_ they’d haul you back in before you could say _no, no, who are you, help!_ If you _are_ a synth, and we _did_ place you with the Nakanos, it’s because they’re with us, and we trusted them to adopt a synth who was young-looking and could use parents.”

“But then why have they been pretending I’m their real daughter?” Kasumi demanded. “Why would they lie to me about something that huge?”

“Because you asked them to,” said Deacon. “Before you forgot.”

“Before you guys _made_ me forget.”

“You think the Railroad goes around jumping random synths and implanting new memories?” Deacon snapped-- well, not really _snapped_ , but his voice had more of an edge to it than I was used to hearing from him. “If you’re a Railroad job, _you_ came to _us_ , and Railroad agents risked their necks and maybe died for you, and the Nakanos took you knowing that if the Institute did come after you, they’d be collateral damage at best, and tortured for information about the Railroad at worst. They chose to lie, and live in fear, so _you_ wouldn’t have to.”

Kasumi’s face had reddened, and she looked down at her lap. Emily reached out and took her hand. 

“Don’t yell at her,” she said to Deacon. “How could she know any of this?”

“Deacon,” I said quietly. He wasn’t behaving like his usual easygoing self; I knew the sight of X9-21 had probably brought back some troubling memories. “If you’d rather have this conversation later-- or if you’d rather I handle this myself--”

“No,” he said. “It’s fine. Sorry I yelled at you, Kasumi. Nora can tell you, all us Railroad old-timers, we’ve all got just a _soupçon_ of PTSD. Except the ones who have a big steaming mess of it. Anyway.” He cleared his throat. “Starting to think those memory wipes weren’t the smartest idea the Railroad ever had. I mean, how are you ever supposed to-- grow, I guess-- if you don’t know-- where you came from, right?”

“Yes,” said Kasumi, looking up, her face still flushed. “Yes, that’s-- I mean, I guess I owe my parents an apology, if I am a synth-- and if I’m not one, too, because if I’m not then I just got all crazy and suspicious and ran away for no reason. But I want to-- I need to know, before I go back. I need to know what I am. Or I won’t know-- I mean, I just need to know.”

“Sure,” said Deacon, “which is where I can actually be helpful. Because we do keep records, for just such an occasion. Heavily encrypted records with constantly changing keys, but I’ve got access-- or I can get access. But not for nothing, because we’ve also got this protocol where before you access any sensitive information you have to have a two-ounce blood sample centrifuged with some equipment we salvaged from Med-Tek that probably was not actually designed to test for Institute nanobots.”

“You don’t have to do that,” I said. “I can head over to HQ myself.”

“With the boss in her current mood, you guys would just get into a yelling match and you’d end up quitting the Railroad, and I’d have to run the heavy route-clearing ops by myself, and I’m way too delicate and sensitive for that,” said Deacon. “I’ll go. But you’re gonna owe me.”

“Sure,” I said. “What do you need?”

Deacon gave me his most charming smile. “A favor. To be stated at a later date.”

“Sure,” I said again.

“Really?” he said. “Just like that? You’re not worried I’m gonna ask for your--” He hesitated, just for a second, where a person would have naturally said _firstborn child_. “--hand in marriage?”

“I trust you,” I said.

He sighed. “You know, when you say stuff like that it just takes all the fun out of messing with you. So I’ll head out to information-gather--”

“Can I come?” Kasumi asked.

“Uh, no,” he said. “No offense, but we don’t take random teenagers to our secret headquarters. You stay here with the Minutemen and farmers and synths and coursers and breeding population of endangered Institute scientists and whoever else Nora’s got living here by the time I get back.” He looked at me. “Is it OK if I grab something to eat before I go?”

“You’re spending the night, aren’t you?” I protested.

“I don’t think so,” he said. “You’ve got your, uh-- I’m not sure I’d sleep.”

“I trust him with my kids,” I said.

“He _is_ your kid,” said Emily.

“That too.”

“And he’d never hurt anyone who’s under our mother’s protection,” Emily added. “He’s not-- he isn’t _mean._ I mean, some coursers were-- they kind of--” She turned to Max, who’d been silent this entire time, and whose eyes widened slightly as Emily addressed him. “Remember X3-44?”

Max shivered, but said nothing.

I looked from Emily to Max. “Wait, did you two know each other? In the Institute?”

“Not very well,” said Emily. “We didn’t ever work together. I didn’t have any surface functionality, and he worked-- oh! G7-95, tell them-- I mean _Max_ \-- tell them who you _did_ work with.”

Max looked puzzled for a moment, and then said, “Oh, G7-81?”

Deacon halted his pacing abruptly. “You knew Glory?”

“Yes,” said Max, smiling even bigger. “Y4-15 says she made it out? Worked for the Railroad? That’s-- amazing.” He sobered. “I’m sorry to hear she--”

“She died a hero,” I said. “Saved my life, and Deacon’s. Among others.”

“That sounds like G7-81,” he said. “Glory. What a great name.”

“Isn’t it?” said Emily. 

“OK, I’m definitely spending the night,” said Deacon. “You don’t sleep much, right, Max? We can stay up all night talking about the late lamented second coolest synth I ever met?”

“Yes, sir,” said Max, smiling again. “Uh, out of curiosity, who was the coolest?”

“Long story,” said Deacon. “Maybe I’ll tell you sometime.” He looked at me. “Meeting adjourned?”

………………………………………….

After Deacon and Max had walked out-- Max already asking, “How could she join the Railroad? Wasn’t she scared she’d be recognized?” and Deacon answering, “Glory wasn’t scared of much”-- I looked at Kasumi, whose hand was still clasped in Emily’s.

“Honey,” I said, “do your parents know where you are?”

She shook her head. 

“Can I send someone to let them know?” I asked. “They must be worried sick. And if you’re going to be here until Deacon gets back--” 

She sighed. “I guess I have to be, right?”

“You’re not a prisoner or anything,” I said, “but where do you want to go, if not home?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “Anywhere. I’ve never been _anywhere_. This was my big runaway adventure, setting off on my own to find out the truth about myself, and now-- I dunno, this feels kind of anticlimactic. Not that you’re not being really nice to me, but--” She smiled a little. “I mean, I already had a mom. I already had people taking care of me, and running errands for me to places I wasn’t allowed to go because it wasn’t safe. Railroad HQ, Diamond City--”

Emily sat up straight. “Mother! You promised Ms. Wright you’d bring me to Diamond City soon!”

“Oh, sweetheart, that was what we call an empty promise,” I said, and Emily said, “You don’t make those. Mother, take me and Kasumi to Diamond City. Neither of us has ever been, and you’ve got a house there, and I want to meet Mr. Valentine, and Ms. Wright said she’d buy me some world-famous noodles--”

“I can make you noodles here,” I said weakly.

Kasumi laughed. “You sound just like _my_ mom.”

Emily smiled, too, but she persisted, “Mother, I know you want to keep me safe, but I _will_ be safe if I go with you, and I’m a good fighter now, you know I am. And Kasumi’s got to be pretty good too if she made it here without getting killed or kidnapped.”

“I mostly hid and ran from stuff,” said Kasumi.

Emily nodded. “My mother says that’s sixty percent of valor.”

“It’s not just the trip there,” I said. “Diamond City is still mostly really anti-synth, and ever since the latest Publick Occurrences, you’re the most notorious synth in the Commonwealth.”

“They’re anti-ghoul, too, and you take Hancock there all the time,” said Emily. “Nobody in their right mind fucks with you, mother.”

I laughed, and so did Kasumi. 

“This is perfect,” said Emily happily. “The trip will be an adventure for Kasumi, and it’ll keep her mind off worrying until Mr. Deacon can tell us more, and I’ll get to meet all your friends, and we’ll be back here soon, and it will make you realize you don’t have to worry about me so much, and you’ll start letting me go on Minutemen calls and help fight raiders and super mutants--”

“Oh my God, baby girl, you have to slow down,” I said. “One step at a time, all right?”

“Yes,” said Emily. “One step at a time. Going to Diamond City is one step.”

“Listen,” I said. “I’m going to ask for volunteers to head up to Kasumi’s parents’ house. Kasumi, will you make a holotape for them, please? For your parents, I mean. Tell them whatever you want, just let them know you’re safe and you’ll be in touch soon. Then, once that’s done, we can talk about maybe-- oh, but if we did, you know Shaun would want to come too, and then X9 wouldn’t know what to do, because he wants to protect Naveena but also Shaun and also kind of you even though you’re a scandalous runaway--”

“Shaun’s needed in the lab,” said Emily authoritatively. “He can come another time, when the experiment is at a less crucial point. And you and Hancock will protect me and Kasumi.”

I slumped, just a little, in my chair. “You’re going to take over the entire world, aren’t you?”

“Today, Diamond City,” said Emily.

“Tomorrow,” I said. “We can’t leave until tomorrow at the earliest.”

Kasumi looked at Emily respectfully. “I need you to give me parent-wrangling lessons.”


	4. linger on the sidewalk where the neon lights are pretty, how can you lose

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ([Petula Clark, "Downtown"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zx06XNfDvk0))

“Hey, Nora,” said the Diamond City security guard on duty, as our little party walked through the gates of Diamond City after the longest trip of my life. “Hey, Hancock. Hey, pretty girls. Hey, Nora and Hancock brought pretty girls!”

“Where’s the pretty girls?” asked Danny Sullivan, putting his head out from the security office. “Oh, how about that.” He emerged fully, beaming, pushing back his face guard. “How’s it goin’, ladies? First time in the big city?”

“Hey, Danny,” I said, as Emily slipped her hand into mine. “This is my daughter Emily, and her friend Kasumi.”

“Oh, shit, _this_ is _Emily_?” Danny said. “Uh, you sure this is a good idea?”

“Not even a little bit,” I said, “but here we are. Gonna let us in?”

“Sure, sure,” said Danny distractedly, staring at Emily, whose grip on my hand tightened. “Uh, hang on just a second, though. Let me give the guys a heads up, OK? Let ‘em know to be on the lookout. I don’t think there’s going to be any trouble, but just in case.”

“You’re sure your guys are all going to be on our side?” I asked. “I’ve heard some of them talking about synths before.”

Danny nodded. “They aren’t all crazy about the idea of synths hanging around here, but none of ‘em’s going to let anybody mess with your kid, Nora. You saved my life. Geneva's, too, and who knows how many more, if--” He looked at Emily. “Miss, if you lose sight of your mom, you just stay in sight of the guys in helmets and pads. We’ll look after you.”

“Thanks, Danny,” I said. “You’re the jewel of the Commonwealth.”

He grinned. “Back in five.”

“Well, we made it,” said Hancock, as Danny and the other guard disappeared through the gates. Kasumi was looking around, wide-eyed, bouncing a little on her toes, seemingly not tired at all; Emily was pressing lightly up against my side. 

“We made it here,” I said. “We still have to make it back out, and then home.”

“True,” he said. “You worried?”

“Not really,” I said. I _was_ feeling a lot better about this whole trip than I had when we’d set off this morning, although the first leg hadn’t exactly gone off without a hitch-- Hancock and I had cleared the route of raiders and super mutants not too long before, and we’d skirted the Mass Pike tunnel to avoid the ferals, but we’d been still been attacked by bugs around South Boston. Emily had brought one bloatfly down with a single shot in midair, smashed a bloodbug’s carapace with the butt of her gun as it zeroed in on Hancock, and when she got stung and started to bleed, she didn’t panic; she just sat down on the ground and reached for one of the stimpaks I’d given her. She was much more distressed when I got hit with a bloatfly larva in the shoulder and Hancock had to pry it out with my knife, but she insisted on watching the process, white-faced and thin-lipped, “in case I ever need to do this for you,” which-- I wasn’t sure if I was horrified or delighted about what a badass my daughter clearly aspired to be, and maybe wasn’t far from being already.

Kasumi had a lot less combat training than Emily, but she was stellar at keeping out of the way and finding cover, and hadn’t gotten hurt at all. We showed both girls how to strip the bugs of the edible-- or cookable, rather-- part of the protoplasm, and how to extract the bloatflies’ glands and stingwings’ barbs. Emily had gotten a little pale over that, too, but she’d watched the whole thing and done the last one herself.

“What’s up, sweetheart?” I asked her now. “Tired?”

She shook her head.

“Nervous?”

“Just--” She smiled at me. “I guess I’m not used to being somewhere that isn’t-- home.”

“Me either,” said Kasumi, “but it’s awesome! And we’re not even inside yet! What are we going to do first?”

“I don’t even know what there is to do,” said Emily.

“Shop,” said Hancock, “eat, drink. Get your hair fixed. Give another interview.”

“We do have to stop in and see Piper,” I said. “And Nick, too. He’s going to be so excited to meet you, baby. And there's plenty more people I want you to meet-- but yes, there's also shopping.”

Emily’s forehead had the little pinch between auburn eyebrows that meant she was worried about something, but before I could ask her what, Danny came back in.

“All right, folks,” he said. “Welcome to Diamond City.”

……………………………………………...

“ _Blue!_ ”

Piper’s arms were around me before I even saw her coming, squeezing me so hard I felt my ribs creak. For a smallish lady, she had a grip like a bear trap. 

“Why didn’t you let me know you were in town?” she yelled in my ear. 

“I literally just got here thirty seconds ago,” I said as she let me go, grinning from ear to ear, and lunged at Emily instead. My reflexes twitched-- I wasn’t used to seeing anybody lunge at Emily-- but it was Piper, so I refrained from knocking her down and let her grab Emily and hug her. Emily didn’t move to hug her back, but she was smiling.

“I can’t believe you actually brought her!” Piper cried. “I assumed you were just lying to make me shut up!”

“See?” I said to Emily. 

Piper had zeroed in on Kasumi. “And what about you, who are you? You’re not a Minuteman. Are you?”

Kasumi shook her head. “Just a friend. My name’s Kasumi.”

“Kasumi?” Piper repeated. “Kasumi _Nakano_?”

Kasumi jumped. “What? How do you know-- what?”

“Your dad comes to town for supplies,” said Piper. “Kenji Nakano, right? He talks about you all the time, you’re like a legend around here. ‘My Kasumi gave me another list of things she needs for her work, I don’t know what they are but she’s so brilliant’-- he says you fixed up their short-wave radio, and got the TV working again--”

Kasumi was blushing furiously. “I-- um, I didn’t realize I was a legend.”

“Great,” said Hancock. “We brought _two_ legends to town.”

Piper was beaming, examining Kasumi as openly and curiously as she did everyone and everything else. “How’d you fall in with these guys, Kasumi? Is there a story here? Can I write it?”

“Yes, there is, and no, you can’t,” I said. “At least not yet. Maybe when it’s done happening. Piper, we’re going to my house to regroup, OK? Check back in with you soon.”

“Yeah, you better!”

………………………………………………..  
“This is our house,” I said to Emily and Kasumi as we reached the red door, ignoring the yells of “hey, hot stuff, let me fix that pretty hair for you!” and “swatters!” and “nan-ni shimasu-ka?” “Hancock, you brought your key too, right? In case we need to split up?”

Hancock nodded. I unlocked the door and stepped inside, flicking the light switch to illuminate the space I’d tried to decorate in an at least semi-homey fashion. I’d hung a Minuteman flag on one wall and a couple of landscapes on another, built some chairs and a sofa and a couple of beds and a cookstove with a vent to the outside, and stocked the place with supplies for when I didn’t feel like paying exorbitant Diamond City prices to eat and drink. It still didn’t feel like home-- I didn’t spend enough time here for it to feel like home-- but at least it was mine, and private, and safe. Relatively safe. 

“What next?” I asked, shrugging my pack off onto the floor; Emily and Kasumi swung their smaller kit bags down, too. “You girls tired? Feel like resting a little before we head back out to explore?”

“No, no, no,” said Kasumi. “I want to look around. I’m not tired. We don’t have much time, and I want to see everything. And go shopping! For circuitry!”

“Oh,” I said. “Well, all right. We can look around. There’s a couple of traders who usually have some good working circuitry, or junk you can disassemble. I can show you--”

“I was kind of hoping I could look around by myself,” said Kasumi. “You know. Since this is my big parent-free adventure, and all. Or Emily and I could go.” She smiled at me winsomely. “I’d take good care of her.”

“I don’t have any money,” said Emily, with the worried little pinch between her eyebrows again.

“I do,” said Kasumi. “A little. I’ll treat you to whatever’s going. Noodles, right?”

I hesitated. I didn’t like the idea of Kasumi wandering around the city alone-- she might not, strictly speaking, have been my responsibility, but I _had_ brought her here, which her parents had apparently never felt comfortable doing, and if anybody started giving her shit because she’d shown up with me and Hancock and Emily-- the synth-lover, the synth-sympathizing ghoul, and the synth herself-- I’d definitely feel responsible for that. But I liked that better than I liked the idea of Emily wandering around with only Kasumi for protection.

Before I could figure out what to say, Hancock said, “Sounds all right to me.”

“Are you serious?” I demanded, caught off guard. “I can’t even begin to think of everything that could go wrong. You know Piper got poisoned at the Dugout Inn one time?”

Hancock had swung his pack off onto the couch, and was rummaging in it. He pulled out a zip-top nylon ammo bag.

“C’mere, sunshine,” he said to Emily, who looked surprised, but stepped forward. “Raise your right hand. You promise you won’t drink anything you haven’t twisted the cap off yourself?”

“I promise,” said Emily, smiling, right hand raised.

“Promise you won’t accept any job offers, or any invitations into anybody’s house?”

“I promise.”

“If anybody starts harassing you, and you can’t get away from ‘em, promise to yell ‘Help! Security!’ at the top of your lungs?”

“I promise.”

“Promise not to go to the Upper Stands?”

“I promise,” said Emily, and Kasumi said, “Why?”

“Because everybody up there is an asshole,” said Hancock. “Plus it’s boring. What do you say, Nora?”

All three of them looked at me.

“Oh-- all right,” I said, and Hancock put the nylon bag in Emily’s raised right hand. It chinked as she closed her fingers around it.

“What’s this?” she asked.

“Walking-around money,” Hancock said. 

“Hancock,” I said. “I have caps. You don’t have to--”

“Let me treat the kid for once,” said Hancock. “Handled herself damn well on the way over here.”

Still clutching the nylon bag in one hand, Emily hesitated for a moment, and then stepped forward, stood on tiptoe, and kissed Hancock’s gnarled, withered cheek. He looked gobsmacked for a second, then lifted a hand and ran it quickly over her hair.

“All right,” he said. “Now, you know it’s my ass on the line, too. If you do anything stupid and get yourself in trouble, your mother’s going to put my head on a pike outside the Castle, as a warning to others who might give her bad advice about you.”

“It’s true,” I said. “Here’s my key, baby girl. Go have fun. Come home when you’re ready. If I’m not here then, wait here for me.”

Emily and Kasumi looked at each other, grinning, and were gone, the door slamming behind them. 

“Alone at last,” said Hancock, and took me in his arms. 

……………………………………………………………..

We dressed again afterwards, more or less immediately, because I couldn’t stop worrying that the girls would come barging back in and be scarred for life, but once I was back into my fatigues, Hancock pulled me back down onto the bed.

“I know you’re tired,” he said, “cause I’m tired, so lay with me a little. Maybe take a nap.”

I laughed. “Are we _that_ old?”

“You’re over two hundred and forty,” he said. “And I quit countin’ when my eyes turned black. Hell yeah, we’re old enough to nap if we feel like it.” 

“I couldn’t possibly sleep,” I said. “Not with Emily out there, wandering the streets of Diamond City. How did you talk me into letting her go out there alone?”

“First off,” he said, “she’s not alone. Second off, you’ve got to stop thinking of everyplace you don’t personally run as enemy territory.”

“I don't,” I said, although I kind of did. “I thought you hated this place.”

“Nah,” he said. “I mean, it’s not where I’d wind up if I ever found a pair of ruby slippers, but-- there’s good people here, same as everywhere. There’s _mostly_ good people, even. I mean, hell, why do you think the Institute had my jackass brother killed? Cause even he wouldn’t have pulled the shit they made that synth pull, not in a million years. He was all right. The synth was probably all right, too, if he hadn’t been so scared of the Institute. And even the Institute, they were probably mostly all right. Look at Hastings and Achanta. Look at X9-21. He was a fuckin’ courser, and now he’s your babysitter and you’re teaching him how to hug.”

“Where _would_ the ruby slippers take you?” I asked, drowsily after all.

“Here,” he said. 

“I thought you just said--”

“Not Diamond City,” he said. “Right here. Next to you. Hey, Nora?”

“Hmm?”

He paused for a moment, and then he said, “Nothing. Never mind. Actually--” He moved, slightly, enough to make me shift myself off him. “You mind if I go out for a bit? Got some errands to run.”

“Sure,” I said. “You want me to come along?”

“No,” he said, and leaned over to kiss me, lingeringly. “You stay here. Be here when the girls get back. Betcha Emily’s going to have a lot to tell you. Later we’ll head over to the Dugout, yeah? Have a drink, catch up on the gossip.”

“OK,” I said peaceably. If Hancock had errands to run that didn’t involve me, I wasn’t going to bug him about it. He had his own life; I was just lucky he chose to spend so much of it with me. “Have fun. See you later. Love you.”

He kissed me again, and got up. I closed my eyes, just for a second, and woke up to the sound of a key in the door, the door opening, laughter that abruptly hushed itself, Emily whispering, “Shh, shh, my mother’s asleep!” and Kasumi whispering back, “Where’s your dad?”


	5. all of these lines across my face

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ([Brandi Carlile, "The Story"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o8pQLtHTPaI))

I stretched and groaned involuntarily, and Emily said, “Oh, we woke you up!”

“I shouldn’t have slept so long anyway,” I said groggily, as the tail end of a bad dream slipped away, something lonely and cold. Cold flesh against mine. “Did you have fun?”

“Emily bought me some stuff,” said Kasumi, “but I’ll pay you back-- I mean, I’ll pay your--” She hesitated. 

“Yeah, ‘boyfriend’ sounds pretty stupid when you’re talking about Hancock, doesn’t it?” I agreed. “You don’t have to pay anybody back, not if Emily wanted to get you a present. Did the two of you have enough for everything you wanted?”

They looked at each other and giggled, in that teenage-girlfriends way I’d almost forgotten about, where you aren’t giggling so much because anything is actually funny as because you know you’re both thinking about the same thing and that somehow seems giggle-worthy. I kind of wanted to keep Kasumi.

“Where’s Hancock?” Emily asked. I wasn’t sure I’d noticed when she first dropped the “Mister” before his name. “We wanted to ask him about something.”

“A mysterious something?” I grinned. “He’s running mysterious errands, too-- I thought he’d be back by now, though. What time is it?”

“Seven,” said Emily, and I said, “Holy shit, no wonder I’m so hungry. Have you two eaten?”

“We had the famous noodles,” said Kasumi. “They were pretty good. Not as good as my mom’s. That was hours ago, though.”

“Do you want to go out for dinner, or stay in?” I asked. “We could always cook the bug meat from earlier.”

“What about the Dugout Inn?” Emily said. “We haven’t been there yet. Oh, we could go get Ms. Wright and Mr. Valentine and we could _all_ eat dinner together!”

“Nick doesn’t eat,” I said, “but otherwise, that sounds great. Did you meet Nick yet?”

“I wanted to wait for you to introduce me,” said Emily. 

I thought about leaving a note for Hancock, but I figured he’d find us at the Dugout either way. I rubbed my eyes, tugged at my wrinkled clothes, ran my fingers through my hair, gave my habitual mental fuck-it-I-probably-look-fine, and stood up. 

“To the detective agency,” I said.  
…………………………………………………………..

As I opened the door to Valentine’s office, Ellie said loudly, “Oh, hello there, Nora!”

“Hi?” I said, puzzled until I opened the door the rest of the way and saw, past Ellie at the front desk, three more people crowded into the tiny office. Nick sat in his desk chair, Piper perched on the desk itself, and Hancock leaned against a filing cabinet; he straightened up when he saw me, looking startled and guilty. 

“Hey, guys,” I said. “Um…” 

“Blue, this is your intervention,” said Piper cheerfully. “It’s about adopting synths. Hancock’s been telling us about your behavior lately. You’re out of control.”

“I can stop anytime I want,” I said. “Seriously, what are you guys all doing here?”

“Which one of you is Emily?” Ellie asked brightly, and, when Emily lifted her hand, “Sweetie, that was a very brave thing you did, letting Piper put you in the newspaper like that. We’re all so proud of you. Look at her, Nick! Isn’t she pretty?” 

“Pretty as a sugar maple,” said Nick, as I raised my eyebrows at Hancock, and he looked away. “It’s an honor to meet you, Miss Bowman.”

“It’s--” Emily was blushing, staring at Nick. “Thank you. I-- you look-- just like--”

“Like a rotting, broken-down old synth?” Nick supplied, the rubber skin of his face stretching into a wry smile. “In a trench coat and fedora? Must be strange, for a girl who used to see shiny new ones of me walking around. But you’re the new, improved model, right? The kind that made my kind obsolete.”

“No, no,” said Emily, still eyeing Nick with fascination. “It wasn’t like that. You-- I mean, the second-generation synths-- the ones who looked like you-- well, my mother’s probably told you.”

“She said they were the ones with guns,” said Nick.

Emily nodded. “They were-- more reliable. Not as advanced, but-- they didn’t run away, or-- rebel. I used to hear the scientists arguing-- some of them said they’d eventually perfect the psychological template for the biological models, like me, and some said unpredictability was inherent in wetware--” She broke off, reddening again. “I’m sorry, Mr. Valentine, I just-- my mother told me about you, I just-- didn’t realize how-- familiar you were going to look.”

“Wish I could say the same,” said Nick. “You’re all right, doll. Truth be told, it’s nice to look familiar to somebody. How about you, Miss Nakano?” he asked, turning abruptly to Kasumi. “I look familiar to you?”

Kasumi shook her head. “But it’s nice to meet you, Mr. Valentine.”

“Yeah, we actually came here to invite you to hang out with us for dinner,” I said. “All of you guys, actually. Conveniently, you all read my mind and assembled here beforehand.”

“Dinner sounds great!” said Piper. “Where should we go? The Dugout Inn?”

 

………………………………………………………..

“You must remember something,” said Nick to Kasumi, his yellow eyes glowing faintly in the dim, dingy light of the Dugout. “Or you wouldn’t be here. You’d be home with your mom and dad.”

“I filled them in,” said Hancock, when I looked at him. “Piper wouldn’t shut up until I did.”

“All off the record, Blue,” said Piper. “For now.”

“I have-- dreams,” said Kasumi, fiddling with her crispy squirrel bits. “And I don’t-- there are gaps in my memory.”

“What kind of dreams?” Nick asked. 

Kasumi looked uncomfortable. “I-- why?”

“Hey, I’m a detective,” said Nick. “I tend to ask a lot of questions. Especially when there’s a mystery afoot.”

“Hold up,” said Hancock to Kasumi. “You dream?”

Kasumi nodded, and Emily, who hadn’t touched her food, said, “I asked Deacon about that, and he said that if the Railroad did do the mind wipe on her, that’s part of it. They don’t just alter memories, they deactivate the sleep inhibitors, for the units that have them. Not all of us did have them, you know-- some units had a sleep cycle. Shaun does. And Eve did. I think it was supposed to improve functionality in units designed for--” She hesitated. “Emotional-- uses.”

“Who’s Eve?” Kasumi asked, as I tried to absorb what Emily had just said. I’d never heard Shaun and Eve mentioned so close together. Alan Binet had lost his wife; I’d lost my son. We’d both been given synth replacements. _Designed for emotional uses._ I didn’t know how to feel about that.

“She--” Emily faltered, and looked at me.

I said, “She lived in one of the scientists’ quarters. That was her, um, assignment. She was-- they called it-- a ‘personal synth.’”

“Oh my God,” said Piper. “Are you for real, Blue? That’s so gross!”

“Yeah, the Institute was a festering cesspit of institutionalized evil,” I said. “This comes as a shock to anybody here? Come on.”

“Let’s hear more about your dreams,” said Nick to Kasumi. 

“It’s-- it’s like I’m in a lab,” she said slowly. “I’m in a white room, and people are talking-- over my head. Like I’m not there, or like I’m not a person. And then this-- this crackling, this surge-- at the back of my head-- like I’ve been-- activated. And everyone turns to look at me all of a sudden. Like they-- expect something.”

“That sounds really creepy,” I said. “But also, not very much like the synth creation process I saw. I guess there could have been an activation process I didn’t see, though.”

“Could it be the place where they reset her memories?” Piper asked.

I shook my head. “It doesn’t look like that. It’s not a white room. Although, maybe she’s dreaming some of the details wrong-- like you remember a little of it, and your mind is filling in the blanks. Or-- well, it could just be a creepy dream. I used to have random nightmares, that weren’t memories-- about being chased by giant spiders, and stuff like that.”

“Yeah, and then you woke up in the Commonwealth!” said Piper. “Where we _wish_ we had giant spiders, because they’d eat the giant roaches!”

Kasumi smiled a little. “Yeah. I don’t know. It’s just this awful feeling-- like-- like I’m a doll. Like these people can make me do and be whatever they want, and it doesn’t matter what I want, because they made me and so I belong to them.”

That sounded a lot like how I’d felt about my parents when I was Kasumi’s age, but I refrained from saying so. We’d find out soon enough whether Kasumi was a synth or just a teenager.

“Well, whatever the truth is, _that’s_ not true anymore,” said Emily encouragingly. “You can do whatever you want.”

“Yeah,” said Kasumi. “Here I am, on my own. More or less. Except for all of you guys. Which is good, really-- I mean, if I would have taken off for Acadia, I’d probably be dead by now.”

“Acadia?” Nick repeated. 

“Oh, yeah,” said Kasumi. “Before my dad brought that newspaper home, I’d been-- I’d gotten this old two-way radio in working order, and I’d been talking to-- some people. Up north. They said they were all runaway synths, that they lived in some kind of-- settlement. They were asking me about myself, and it was them who made me think maybe--”

“Wait, where exactly were these people?” I asked. “How far north?”

“Way up,” she said. “Outside the Commonwealth. Past Far Harbor. I was all set to go there, and then I saw the paper, and I thought-- well, I guess I thought before I jumped off the deep end and left the Commonwealth completely, I could-- meet Emily.” She smiled at Emily, a lovely, shy, brilliant smile that transformed her face; Emily smiled back, her own happiest, widest smile. “And just-- see. If she could help me figure stuff out.”

“Well, we’re glad you came to us,” I said, and looked at Nick; he gave me a quick nod that I was pretty sure meant we would be following up on this Acadia thing. I’d have to ask Deacon whether the Railroad knew about this. And if so, why hadn’t they told me? Deacon’s tactful meddling aside, Desdemona and I were overdue for a knock-down-drag-out. 

(Or maybe Hancock was right about how I felt about places and organizations I wasn’t personally in charge of. Paladin Danse’s constant talk of orders and duty had irritated me so much I’d never gone back to talk to him again after the ArcJet Systems mission, which might have been a mistake; maybe if I’d joined the Brotherhood I could have avoided their destruction. Maybe. I’d never know now.)

“I’m glad too,” Emily was saying, still beaming. “You got my mother to bring me to Diamond City!”

“Pretty sure _you_ got your mother to bring _me_ to Diamond City,” Kasumi corrected.

“But you were the catalyst!” said Emily. “Mother, how long can we stay?”

“Mmm,” I said. “You haven’t had enough yet?” Emily groaned softly, and I smiled at her. “Well, Deacon will be getting back in a few days, and we don’t want to leave him hanging around at the Castle. We’ll spend tonight and tomorrow night, let’s say, and leave early in the morning day after tomorrow, unless we discover some pressing business to keep us here longer. Okay, seriously, what is with all the mysterious glances being exchanged at this table?”

Hancock and Piper looked up at me guiltily. If Piper hadn’t been one of my best friends and Hancock hadn’t been-- Hancock-- I would probably have been jealous and suspicious; as it was, I was just confused.

“ _You_ exchanged a mysterious glance with Mr. Valentine just now,” said Kasumi.

“That’s true, I did,” I said. “All right, we’ll discuss mysterious glances later. You girls aren’t eating.”

They both looked down at their plates, and then at each other, and giggled.

“We’re too excited to eat,” said Emily. “What do we do next? What happens here at night?”

“Not that much, actually,” said Nick. 

Piper nodded. “I mean, there are some traders that stay open all night-- but you girls are probably shopped out for the day. Have you met Travis yet?”

“Travis from the radio?” Kasumi asked. "My mom loves him."

“There we go!” said Piper, as enthusiastically as if Kasumi had squealed and jumped up and down. “I’ll walk you girls over there. Hey, let’s go right now. You’re obviously not hungry. Nick, you come with us. You’re not eating either.”

“Whoa, where’s the fire?” I asked, as Piper stood up quickly, Emily and Kasumi followed suit more slowly, and Nick whirred and rose last, glancing from Piper to Hancock to me, and looking away quickly when he met my gaze.

“There’s only so much time for the girls to see everything and meet everyone!” said Piper, her voice pitched just a tiny bit higher than usual. “You two finish up your meal! See you soon, OK?”

I watched the four of them leave, and then said to Hancock, “What in the world was all that about?”

He shrugged uncomfortably. “You know Piper. Always a little overstrung.”

“Oh, bullshit,” I said. “Something’s going on. If you don’t want to tell me, fine, but don’t _lie_ about it.”

“OK, so I don’t want to tell you,” said Hancock.

I shrugged. “Fine.”

About four seconds went by, and Hancock said, “I do want to tell you. Come outside.”

“Well, this meal was a waste of good caps,” I said. “Outside where?”

“Just outside.”

…………………………………………………………….

I followed him to the park bench at the foot of the stairs into the city, where he sat down, and I sat down next to him, eyeing him warily. 

“You’re acting really weird,” I said.

“Listen, Nora,” he said, his voice raspier than usual. “This thing we got, I-- I never thought-- I’ve never been--” He swallowed. “Christ, I don’t know why this is so hard.”

“ _What’s_ so hard?” I asked. “I don’t get it. What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he said. “That’s the thing. Nothing’s wrong. Being with you, it’s-- it’s like, my whole life before I met you, it felt like I was just-- doing my best to deal with the fact that everything was shit. Not that I didn’t do all right, because I did, but nothing was ever really-- Nora, I-- being with you-- it doesn’t matter what we’re doing, if I’m with you, it’s-- good. It’s better than good, it’s--”

His black eyes were bright and rimmed with red.

“Hey,” I said softly. “I feel the same way. You know that. What’s all this about?”

“I just don’t want to fuck this up,” he said. “I don’t want to make things weird between us, or make you think I’m not happy with the way things are, because I am. I could go like this with you forever. But I want--” He took a deep breath. “I want you to marry me.”

I sat there for a second, staring at him.

“I know-- you’ve still got that, that ring on,” he said, as I became aware that my mouth was hanging open, and closed it. “And I get why you still wear it. I know I’m not-- the love of your life, not the way you’re mine. I know I couldn’t ever-- take his place. But I asked Piper and Valentine what they thought, and Piper said-- she said you’ve got nine other fingers.”

He slid his hand into his pocket, and pulled out a ring. It shone silver under the streetlights.

“Where-- where did you get that?” I asked, a little dizzily. I didn’t have any problem with the idea of looting raiders’ corpses in general, but the idea of looting them for wedding rings did seem a little-- 

“Curie gave it to me,” he said. “Last time we stopped by 81. Remember when we went to the classroom to talk to the kids, and that one little girl got hysterical and I left?”

I did remember. I’d felt a little bad about not following him, but the kids had been so excited about hearing my Commonwealth stories that I hadn’t wanted to disappoint them, and he’d seemed perfectly cheerful when I found him again, hanging out with Curie in the lab.

“She told me about this conversation she had once, with one of those doctors she lived with, before,” he said, turning the ring over in his fingers. “How he came to the vault right after his wife died-- and how he wanted so bad to figure out how to cure the thing she had, in memory of her. And he’d kept her ring, and after he died, Curie was gonna-- what did she say-- _inter_ it with him, but then she changed her mind. She said-- you know that little accent she’s got-- she said, ‘I think to myself, maybe someone else will wear zis someday, someone it will mean somesing to, after all zis time.’”

“That’s a terrible Curie impression,” I said.

“Come on, Nora,” he said. “If you don’t want-- look, it’s fine. Forget it.” He started to put the ring back in his pocket. “I shouldn’t have--”

“John,” I said, and took his hand in mine, feeling the rough, thickened ridges of skin, the smooth metal edge of the ring against my fingertip. “Listen. Nate _was_ the love of my life.”

“I know,” he said. “I get it, it was a dumb idea, I--”

“Shut up a second and let me finish,” I said. “Nate was the love of my life. And I’ll always remember him, and there’s part of me that’s always going to miss him, just like I’ll always kind of-- grieve-- for that life I used to have, and the future I could have had, if-- but that life, it’s gone. And so is he. And so is-- the person I was, when I was with him. Me-- now-- my new life-- you’re the love of my crazy new life, John Hancock, and-- yes. Yes, absolutely, yes, I love you, I will marry you, give me that ring, are you kidding me, Curie gave you this ring with this adorable story attached _months_ ago and you waited until _now_ to give it to me?”

“Whoa there, General,” said Hancock, starting to laugh, clutching the ring in his fist and pulling it away from my grasping hand. “Not until the preacher tells me to.”

“What are we waiting for?” I asked, laughing with him. “The chapel’s right there. Come on, Mr. Mayor. Let’s get hitched.”


	6. so wherever you go, you better take care of me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ([(Shawn Colvin, "Round of Blues")](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZyGkpXoyWY)

“Wait, wait, wait,” said Hancock, still holding his fist with the ring in it out of my reach. “We need witnesses. And you want Emily there, don’t you? And do you want to-- change, or something?” 

I was grinning so hard my face ached. “What, you don’t like my ballistic-weave military fatigues that still probably have bug guts on them from when I fought off a bunch of giant bugs and then took a nap in them?”

“Not that you’re not a knockout in those,” said Hancock, “which yes, they do still have bug guts on them.”

“Well, if you would have told me when we were packing last night that today was going to be my wedding day--”

“Wedding day,” said Hancock, and laughed. “Doesn’t really sound like us, does it?”

“That’s not even the half of it,” I said. “I’m going to be your _wife_.”

I expected him to laugh again, but instead he made a soft noise like I’d punched him in the stomach, and then put his arms around me, dragged me close and kissed me. It was a long, sweet kiss, and I wasn’t in any hurry to end it. I’d never kissed a ghoul other than Hancock. If it hadn’t been him, everything strange and faintly un-human about his kiss-- the odd, hard, callus-like texture of his lips, the relative dryness of his mouth, the lack of a nose to bump against mine-- might have been off-putting, but from our first kiss, it had just meant there was no mistaking kissing Hancock for kissing anyone I loved any less.

Someone wolf-whistled from nearby; someone else yelled, “That’s fuckin’ disgusting, lady!” I briefly considered breaking the kiss to get up and kick their ass, then changed my mind, because I didn’t really give a shit and I was pretty sure, at this moment, Hancock didn’t either.

When we finally stopped kissing, Hancock said, “Aw, shoot. We’re supposed to do that _after_ the preacher gives permission, right?”

“Yeah, I don’t think either one of us is big on waiting for permission,” I said. “For anything. What _are_ we waiting for? For Piper and Valentine to get back with the girls?”

“Mm-hmm,” he said. “And so I can enjoy being engaged for a hot minute. And so you can tell me how this works. We make promises to each other, right? What do we promise?”

“You don’t know?” I laughed. “You just asked me to marry you and you don’t even know what that means?”

“I know what it _means_ ,” he said. “I just don’t know what we _say_.”

“You want the script?” I said. “I mean, it’s different for everybody. Some people write their own vows. Nate and I were Episcopalians--”

“Episca-what now?”

“It’s a type of Christian,” I said. “So we just did the basics. I, Nora, take you-- John-- to be my husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death do us part, and thereto I plight thee my troth.”

“That’s some fancy cussin’ for a country ghoul like me,” said Hancock. “Gonna need to pop some Mentats to get through that.”

I elbowed him. “Yeah, you’re such a yokel. The frock coat and tricorn hat really sells it. Anyway, you don’t have to say that exact stuff-- I really doubt the pastor of the All Faiths Chapel is going to be a stickler for wording. All it is, we just promise it’s you and me, from here on out. No matter what. Until I die.”

“Or I do,” said Hancock.

I shook my head. “Nah, we’re gonna have to put a clause in there where you’re not allowed to go first. I’m not doing that again. Plus, you already promised me that after I die you’re going to look after my kids. Why are we even talking about dying right now?”

“Because we’re talking about how long we’re in this thing together,” he said. “We could be saying ‘forever,’ I guess, except for how we’re both grown-ass adults living in the Commonwealth in 2290, and we’ve seen a whole lot of forevers come to a screeching, mangled halt.”

“Fair point,” I said. “So. Forever, or until you bury me, whichever comes first. Deal?”

He nodded. “And if I die first--”

“That’ll be a clear contract violation,” I said, “in consequence of which I’m gonna drag your corpse down to the waterline and leave you for the mirelurks.”

He grinned and put out his hand. “Deal.”

We shook.

“Wait,” he said. “Did we just get married?”

“You have to do it in front of the preacher to get the tax break,” I said.

“‘Tax break’?”

“Oh, right,” I said. “Well, still. To make it official. Hey, look who it is.”

Piper was walking towards us, quickly, leaning forward as if into the wind. When Hancock put out his fist and gave a thumbs-up, Piper screamed so earsplittingly that three nearby security guards cocked their weapons.

……………………………………………………………….

After Piper had hugged me again, so hard and long that I had to beg her for mercy before she let go, and then hugged Hancock, and then dropped down on the park bench and dragged us down on either side of her, smiling from ear to ear, and started demanding to be allowed to write a piece on our wedding because “this is news, this is major news, you guys, the general of the Minutemen and the mayor of Goodneighbor, what does this mean for the future of the Commonwealth?” I finally managed to say, “Where did you ditch my daughter?”

“Oh, she and Kasumi are enjoying the moonlight and the neon and all that fine Diamond City ambiance,” she said. “Over by the water.”

“Are they still with Valentine?”

“He went back to the agency,” said Piper. 

I nodded. “Well, can we round everybody back up? Because we were thinking about going ahead and getting this done tonight, so anybody that wants to be there--”

“Wait, wait, not so fast,” said Piper. “We can’t do this tonight. We’ve got to go shopping! We’ve got to get you a dress!”

“A _dress_?”

“Don’t you take that tone,” said Piper. “I’ve seen you in a dress before.”

“Was I really, really drunk at the time?”

“Yes,” Piper admitted. “It was right after you’d found out Shaun was-- well, you _thought_ you’d found out that Shaun was ten, instead of a baby, and you realized you were going to have to cross the Glowing Sea to ask that Virgil guy how to get inside the Institute, and Nick was still talking like Kellogg sometimes-- you kind of had a lot going on. Nick brought you back here, and we took you out for drinks-- remember? To take your mind off things.”

I squinted at her. “At what point in this incredibly depressing reminiscence do I end up in a dress?”

“It was a long night,” said Piper. “Regardless, I’m as function-over-form-y as the next lady, but you _have_ to wear a dress for your _wedding_ , Blue. We’ll go shopping and find you something nice. Not too froufy. And we’ll wash your hair, and maybe bum some lipstick off Ellie--”

“Oh my God,” I said, at the same time that Hancock said, “Piper, will you shut up before she changes her mind about this whole thing?”

“I’m just so excited,” said Piper happily. “It’s been ages since anybody I knew got married. Well, Nat’s teacher got married last year, but that was just… odd. And you guys! You love each other so much and it’s just so sweet and I’m so happy for you both!”

“Yeah, yeah,” I said. “We’re pretty stupid happy ourselves. But I guess we can live in sin one more night. Let me go find Emily, though-- I don’t want the girls wandering around alone all night long.”

“How about this?” said Piper. “I’ll go tell the girls to head for your house, you two go tell Valentine your news, and we’ll all turn in early so we can be up bright and early in the morning and do whatever wedding preparations we deem necessary.”

“ _You_ deem necessary.”

“You don’t have the proper objective distance!” said Piper. “I’ll see you in the morning, Blue!”

…………………………………………………………..

We did head over to the agency, where Ellie squealed almost as loudly as Piper had, and Nick solemnly shook hands with Hancock and bowed genteely over my hand.

“Congratulations, sir,” he said, “and best wishes to you, ma’am. When’s the joyous event?”

“Tomorrow sometime,” I said. “Check in with Piper, she wants to prepare for it or something.”

Nick laughed. “Fair enough. Don’t do it without me, though.”

“We won’t.” I hugged him, and he hugged back, and I hugged Ellie too, and then Ellie, who’d always been a little jumpy around Hancock, hugged him too, and Hancock and I headed back towards the red door of Home Plate. 

It was empty, but the girls arrived home not that long after, seeming quieter and more subdued than they had all day. Well, it had been a long and eventful one.

“What’s going on?” Kasumi asked, sitting down opposite the couch where Hancock and I had settled. “Ms. Wright said you had news.”

“Oh,” I said. “Uh, yeah. Well, Hancock and I are getting married.”

“Oh, wow,” said Kasumi. “Congratulations! That’s cool for you guys.”

I looked at Emily, who was standing very still, her face expressionless. It was a familiar pose to me, though not on Emily; it was the way X9-21 stood when he was nervous or uncertain.

“You all right, sweetheart?” I asked her, and she said, “Yes, ma’am.”

I looked at Hancock, whose eyes had widened, and then stood up.

“Excuse me,” I said. “Just a second, you guys. I need to talk to Emily alone.”

I took Emily by the hand and led her up the stairs and out onto the roof of my little house, where I’d hauled a little loveseat and coffee table for, OK, Hancock and me to sit and drink and stargaze. Sue me if I get mushy sometimes.

“Sit down, baby girl,” I said, taking a seat myself, and patting the waterproof cushion beside me. “What’s wrong?”

She sat down beside me, not quite meeting my eyes. “Nothing, mother.”

“Emily,” I said. “Sweetheart, you haven’t called me _ma’am_ since the night we named you. There’s obviously something wrong.”

“It was just a-- a slip of the tongue, mother,” she said.

“Uh-huh,” I said. “So if I called you ‘unit,’ and then claimed it was just a slip of the tongue, you wouldn’t be weirded out.”

“That’s not the same,” she said. “You’ve never called me ‘unit.’ It would be like if you accidentally called me Ruby.”

“And you wouldn’t find that weird, either?”

“No, m-mother,” she said.

I reached out and cupped her face in my hand. “My darling daughter, I’m pretty sure you just barely caught yourself before you called me ma’am again, and I’m going to get to the bottom of this if it takes all night. Did something happen earlier that’s upsetting you, or is this about me and Hancock getting married?”

Her lip quivered, and she leaned forward and put her head down on my shoulder. I put my arms around her.

“All right,” I said, holding her close, feeling her heartbeat against me. “Hey, now. It’s all right. Whatever it is, it’s all right. You just have to tell me whatever you need from me, sweetheart, that’s all you ever need to do.”

She breathed softly against me for a little while, and then she said, “If you marry Hancock, does that make him my father?”

“Um,” I said. “Stepfather, I guess. Does that-- is that--” A thought crossed my mind, one that felt like a horrible betrayal of Hancock even to entertain for a second, but how many stories had I heard, of women who refused to entertain for a second the idea that their wonderful boyfriends or husbands would-- “Has he ever done anything to scare you, or make you uncomfortable?”

“No, no, no,” she said. “Never. He’s never been anything but kind to me, mother. It’s just--”

I rubbed her back, dizzy with relief. “Just what, baby?”

“It’s hard to explain,” she said, and sat up, pulling herself out of my arms. I took her hands instead, and she held mine tight, looking up into my face seriously. 

“I know you love me, mother,” she said. “And I know that to you, I’m a person. But for five years before I met you, I wasn’t a person to anyone. I was a thing. In the Institute I was at least a valuable thing, and nobody hit me, or cut me, or, or raped me--”

“One guy did,” I said, “and the only reason I haven’t made it my mission to find him and put a bullet in his head is because you won’t tell me his name.”

“I know,” she said, somewhat dreamily. “I think about it, sometimes. How I could tell you, and it would be like-- like what he tried to do to me, how he gave orders to have me wiped. I could-- have him killed. If I wanted to.” She grinned at me suddenly, a spark of mischief in her eyes. “It’s good to know.”

“Literally anytime,” I said, smiling back at her. “I may not be about to win any cupcake baking contests, but you need the shit murdered out of somebody, I’m the mother you call.”

“What is a cupcake baking contest?” she asked.

“It’s a thing I would have probably had to do at some point, if the world hadn’t come to an end,” I said. “I’ll explain later if you really want to know, but right now, I’m more interested in why you called me _ma’am_ a minute ago. You were saying that people used to treat you like a thing.”

She nodded. “And the only reason people treat me like a person now, is because of you.”

“That’s not true,” I said. “Everybody who knows you loves you. They know you’re a person.”

“But they only got to know me because of you,” she said. “Because you made me feel safe enough to tell _you_ what I was, and then you told everyone I was a synth and I was your daughter and to deal with it, and everybody respects you, or at least if they don’t then they don’t want to get in a fight with you, and if they do get a fight with you then you kill them so I don’t have to worry about them anyway.”

I nodded; it was a pretty fair resumé. “OK. Sure.”

“So my whole life,” she said, “the only reason I’m safe, and happy, and a person, is because of you. Because you love me.” 

“OK,” I said again. “Sure. I mean, that just means I’m doing a halfway acceptable job of being your mother. That you’re safe and happy and people treat you like a person. So I’m not quite seeing what the problem is. Are you thinking-- oh, sweetheart, you’re not worried I’m going to stop loving you, are you? Or taking care of you? Because I’m getting married?”

“No,” she said, her lip quivering. “That’s not it. I just-- I guess I’ve been feeling like-- like if I’m doing a good enough job at being your daughter, then I’m doing a good enough job in-- in general. At life. At being a person.”

I considered this in silence for a little while, the possible implications, before I ventured, “And now that you’re kind of going to be Hancock’s daughter too, are you maybe worried about doing a good enough job at that, too? Living up to his expectations, as well as mine?”

“Yes,” she said. “But that’s not all.”

“What else?” I asked. 

Her blue eyes were enormous as she said, very softly, almost in a whisper, “Kasumi kissed me.”


	7. hold it high for me, light and guide me through; hold it high for me, I'll do the same for you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ([Josh Ritter, "Lantern"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIq3sbwDCjo))
> 
> (this is my new favorite song/ official theme song of this entire fic)

I successfully suppressed all the reflexes that made me want to shriek “ _What?_ ” and smack myself in my stupid face for not noticing what was happening right in front of me. 

Emily’s eyes were fixed on my face, anxious, waiting for some kind of reaction.

“Well,” I said. “How do you feel about it?”

Even in the moonlight, I could see Emily’s cheeks flush. “I-- I don’t-- I don’t know.”

“That’s fine, sweetheart,” I said. “It just happened, right? And it’s a lot to process. Your first kiss.”

“It wasn’t my first kiss,” she said, looking away, and my mind veered around for a second before I figured out--

“Kisses somebody forces on you don’t count,” I said.

Her voice was flat and expressionless. “He didn’t force me.”

“Just to be clear, are we talking about the guy in the Institute?” I asked, and she nodded. “Emily, sweetheart, he might not have physically forced you, but you said he gave you orders. You didn’t choose to kiss him, you obeyed someone who had power over you. That’s completely different. Unless-- Kasumi didn’t-- she didn’t _pressure_ you, did she?”

“She-- surprised me,” said Emily, blushing hotter, her face turned away from me. “But-- no. I could have-- stopped her, but I-- I didn’t want to.” Her eyes were fixed on the distance, across the moon-and-neon-lit vista of Diamond City-- towards the water, where I assumed this kiss had happened, while Hancock and I were canoodling across town. Maybe there was something in the air here. “It felt-- good.”

“Then this was your first kiss,” I said. “Congratulations.”

She turned her head quickly back to me. “Is it-- is it all right? For me? To--”

“To kiss people?” I asked. “Or to kiss Kasumi in particular?”

“Either,” she said. “Both. Kasumi. What if she’s a synth? Isn’t it wrong to kiss a-- a relative?”

“Huh,” I said. “Well. I mean-- if she _is_ a synth, then yeah, there’s a genetic relationship there, through Shaun-- Father-- but, I mean, honestly, I don’t know how the science of you guys works. If it makes you all genetically siblings, or more like-- fourth cousins. I do know everybody on earth-- every human-- can trace their genetics back to the same place, if you go back far enough. And Kasumi’s not-- I’m not her mom, Emily, you know? She’s already got a mom. She’s not your sister, that way. I think it’s-- it’s kind of up to you, to decide how related you feel to every other synth in the world. It’s not like you’ve got birth defects from a shared gene pool to worry about. But I mean, if it feels weird to you, if you guys want to hold off doing anything else until we find out if she _is_ a synth--”

_\--and, incidentally, give me a second to catch up to the fact that you’re kissing people now._

“Doing anything else?” Emily was actually shaking now; I could feel her hands trembling in mine. 

“Or just-- kissing again,” I said. “Or not. Like I said. It’s up to you. Do you feel comfortable saying no to her?”

“Should I?” she asked. 

“Should you feel comfortable, or should you say no to her?”

“Should I say no,” said Emily. “Should I-- stop, should I not, because I’m not-- I mean, we don’t-- I mean, Eve did, but I’m not-- that kind of-- I don’t--”

“You don’t have kissing functionality?” I teased gently, and she laughed, harder than I expected, putting her hands up to her mouth to cover it. 

“Yes, exactly,” she said.

“Well, back in the Institute, you thought you didn’t have surface functionality,” I pointed out. “But look at you now. Emily, you can do anything you want to in this world. You already use weapons and shoot bloatflies and braid your hair and bully me into taking you on trips. Screw the Institute and what they designed you for. You do what you want. And if you want to kiss people--”

“I wouldn’t want to kiss just anyone,” said Emily.

I smiled. “Well, that’s good. That could get exhausting.”

Emily was still red in the face, but she’d stopped trembling. “It’s just-- she’s, Kasumi, she’s the first person who-- everyone else that knows me, it’s because you introduced me to them. But Kasumi and Max, they read what I said, in the paper, and they liked it, and they came to the Castle to-- and Max, that’s different, because he remembers me when I was Y4-15. We weren’t friends or anything, but we knew each other by sight. But Kasumi, she just-- she said she read the thing in the paper and she thought, that girl, she’s a synth and she’s brave enough to do this and she’s smart and kind and-- she said, she thought, if that’s what a synth is like, maybe it’s all right to be one. And not just in an all-synth refuge up north. Anywhere.”

“She told you all that?”

Emily nodded. “She said those synths she was talking to up north, they were all right but their leader-- the one she talked to the most-- he kind of spooked her a little. Talking about how she belonged with her own kind-- and telling her that her parents would kill her if they found out what she was--”

Yeah, I was definitely going to have to clear a chunk of my calendar to head up to Acadia and see what the deal was. Maybe Hancock and I could have a Far Harbor honeymoon.

“She said I gave her hope,” said Emily wonderingly.

I smiled at her. “You sound so surprised. Isn’t that why you gave Piper that interview in the first place? To give people hope?”

“Yes,” said Emily, “but I didn’t think it would _work_.”

We both laughed, and I said, “So, it sounds like Kasumi really likes you. Do you like her?”

“I-- I mean, yes,” said Emily. “I like her very much.”

“And you liked kissing her?”

Emily nodded. “But-- it felt-- it feels-- it scares me. Because-- it felt good-- and I didn’t know if it was right-- or-- I wanted to, to ask you about it-- and then when we got home and you said-- you told us the news-- about you and Hancock--” She swallowed.

I squeezed her hand. “And that made you more nervous?”

She nodded. “Because then I thought, I don’t know what _he_ might-- think-- either--” She gave me a small, sheepish smile. “It wasn’t a-- a rational reaction, mother. I just-- felt--”

“Uncertain,” I suggested, when she trailed off. “You didn’t know how I’d react, if I knew the truth. And the last time you felt that way-- look at that, we cracked the case of the mysterious ‘ma’am’.” Valentine would be proud.” I leaned over and kissed her forehead; it was hot, as if she had a fever. “Sweetheart, Hancock loves you, and he’s proud of you, and everything you’ve accomplished, just like I am. I don’t know that he loves you quite as much as I do, but that’s only because I love you so goddamn much it’s off the scale. And-- here’s the thing, Emily.”

She waited, while I sorted through exactly what I wanted to say. 

“It’s normal to feel-- nervous, a little bit, about the whole thing,” I said finally. “The idea of kissing somebody. And you’re not wrong to be a little bit scared about it, because it’s new, and because anytime you start liking somebody in that way, you’re making yourself vulnerable. To rejection, or disappointment, or-- loss. God knows I got my own little heart broken a few times, before I ever met Nate. And it wasn’t even always people I really loved, it was just-- people I was kissing. That I liked, and had opened myself up to, emotionally, and then it didn’t work out for whatever reason-- and it hurt. So yeah, baby, it’s scary, and it’s risky, and you know I want to keep you safe and make sure you never get hurt, but-- even if I could, I shouldn’t. Because taking risks, and doing scary things, and even getting hurt sometimes and learning from it and moving on, is part of what makes life worth living. So that’s all-- perfectly normal. And. Emily, look at me, OK? Look me in the eye.”

She did.

“Whatever risks you take,” I said, “whatever you get out there and try, whatever mistakes you might make or regrets you might have-- and you’re going to make mistakes and have regrets, because that’s just part of being a person-- but whatever happens, there’s one thing you don’t ever have to be scared of, or worry about even a little bit. There is nothing-- _nothing_ \-- you could possibly do-- or that anyone else could possibly do-- that would make me love you less, or make you anything other than my precious daughter. All right? Do you believe me?”

Twin tears ran down her cheeks as she nodded.

“Good,” I said. “As long as that’s clear, we can go back inside whenever you want.”

She wiped her tears away. “I-- is it all right if I stay out here for a bit?”

“Of course,” I said. “Do you want to be alone?”

“Not-- necessarily,” she said.

“So if I go inside, and Kasumi says she’s gonna come up here and stargaze with you--”

Her blush, which had faded a bit, returned in force. “I wouldn’t-- you don’t need to stop her.”

“All right, sweetheart,” I said. “And you’re all right with me and Hancock getting married tomorrow?”

“Of course, mother,” she said.

“Then I’ll see you in the morning.”

……………………………………………………….

When I got back inside, Kasumi was saying, “So what happened to Bobbi No-Nose?”

“Ended up leaving Goodneighbor,” said Hancock. “I didn’t hold a grudge, but she didn’t seem convinced of that. Hey, Nora. Emily all right?”

“She’s fine,” I said. “She’s going to stay up on the roof for awhile. You know how much she loves to stargaze.” 

“Oh, that sounds nice,” said Kasumi. “Would it be OK if I head up there too, for a bit? I’m way too keyed up to sleep yet.”

I managed to refrain from grabbing her, dragging her underneath the nearest lightbulb, and demanding her intentions towards my vulnerable and innocent child. She was a vulnerable and innocent child, too. It sounded like she’d been pretty sheltered her whole life-- or the whole life she could remember, anyway-- and she was just figuring stuff out, same as Emily. Maybe not all the same stuff, but still.

“Sure,” I said. “Emily won’t mind the company.”

She took the steps to the second floor two at a time, and scrambled out onto the roof.

“She really all right?” Hancock asked me, when the door had closed behind Kasumi. “Been quite awhile since I heard her call you _ma’am_.”

I sat down on the couch next to him, and let out my breath.

“Kasumi kissed her,” I said, and Hancock said, “ _What?_ ”

I couldn’t help giggling. “Shhh. Yeah, that’s exactly what I managed not to scream at Emily.”

“Goddamn,” said Hancock, and stood up, and started pacing. “She’s only six years old!”

“Almost seven,” I said. “And-- you know. She’s been nineteenish since she was born. They don’t really cover this in the parenting books, even if I’d ever gotten to the volumes past the first year.”

Hancock smacked the wall. “Hell. I guess it’d be bad taste for me to warn a scrawny teenage girl that she better not break Emily’s heart or I’m gonna beat her up.”

I grinned at him. “Hancock, we can’t beat up everybody in the world who poses any kind of emotional risk to Emily.”

“We won’t know that until we try,” he said grimly.

“I love you for the impulse, but promise me you’ll be cool about this,” I said. “Emily’s already worried you’re going to disapprove.”

He frowned. “What does she care if I disapprove?”

“You’re going to be her stepfather,” I pointed out, and he sank down abruptly onto the floor, his back against the wall.

“Stepfather,” he said, tasting the word.

“Yep,” I said. “Didn’t think of that, did you. You want to back out now?”

“Fuck no,” he said. “I’m just trying to deal with the fact that you actually want me not just for your _husband_ , but for your kids’ _stepfather_.”

“I think you’re going to be fantastic at both, frankly,” I said.

“Really,” he said. “Me. The guy who first impressed you by brutally knifing a man to death in front of you.”

“That was just infatuation,” I said. “A girlish crush. I didn’t truly fall in love with you until I saw your strongroom.”

He chuckled. “You did have stars in your eyes when you came to tell me you’d accidentally tried to rob me.”

“Oh, well, actually, that was because Fahrenheit had just given me a fucking badass gun.”

“Where is the Ashmaker, anyway?” Hancock asked absently. “You never use it anymore.”

“It’s at home, in my fucking badass weapons trunk,” I said. “Listen, I guess we should try to get some sleep. I mean, I’m not actually going to _sleep_ , but I should at least gesture in that direction. Lie down and close my eyes, that kind of thing.”

“You want a drink?” he asked. “Take the edge off?”

“Nah,” I said, standing up. “Lying awake and fretting about your daughter’s love life is one of those quintessential mom experiences. In forty years I’ll want to remember it clearly. Remember the time Emily had her first kiss from that runaway who-- thought she was a synth slash was a synth-- and we freaked out?”

“Sounds like a plan,” he said, as I crossed to him and offered a hand to help him up off the floor. He took it and let me haul him up. “The forty-years-from-now thing, I mean.”

“Counting on it,” I said, and kissed him quickly. “Come to bed. Lie awake with me.”

“What if I fall asleep?”

“Then keep breathing in and out, and do that thing where your heart beats regularly,” I said. “I find that soothing.”

“These are reasonable requests,” said Hancock.

“You’d think, wouldn’t you.”

“Enough with the guilt trip,” he said. “I promise never to die.”

I leaned against him. “You’re so good to me. Let’s get married tomorrow.”


	8. strap yourself to a tree with roots, you ain't going nowhere

“Wakey wakey, Blue,” said Piper, shaking my shoulder, and I opened gritty-feeling eyes and blinked at her as resentfully as I knew how to blink. “C’mon. It’s after eleven. Everybody else has been up and around for hours.”

“Shit, my sleep schedule is all fucked up,” I said, dragging myself up. “You know what I really miss? Coffee. I used to drink coffee every single morning. It was a reason to get up.”

“You need coffee to motivate you to get up on your wedding day?” Piper tossed something purple and sparkly at me. “Try that on.”

“Piper, if I put a dress on, Hancock won’t even recognize me.”

“All the more reason,” said Piper. “He needs to get to know you in a variety of outfits if you two are going to be married.”

“‘A variety of outfits’?” I said, squeezing the purple thing between my hands. It was sort of scrunchy, and not too sparkly, really. Glimmery, maybe. “Like I should dress up as a Brotherhood paladin and call him a filthy ghoul?”

“What you two do behind closed doors is your own business,” said Piper. “Quit stalling and put the dress on, Blue.”

“I should go wash up first,” I said. “I’m gonna get this all sweaty. Whose is this?”

“Yours, if you like it,” said Piper. “So go wash. Say hi to Sheng. You have ten minutes.”

“Why ten minutes?”

“So you don’t dilly-dally,” said Piper. “I’ve got four more dresses for you to try on so you don’t have an excuse to get married in camo, and then we’ve got to get your hair done, and then--”

“Where’s Hancock?” I asked, feeling the need for backup. 

“No idea,” said Piper. “Haven’t seen him this morning. I tracked Emily down and she gave me the key you gave her. Here it is, by the way.” She tossed it at me.

“Where’s _she_?” I asked, pocketing it.

“Shopping with Kasumi,” said Piper. “Nine minutes, Blue!”

I pulled my boots on and, without lacing them up, got out the door.

The bright sunlight crashed into my eyeballs, and I squinted and shuffled on my way to the water, feeling moderately like hell. I’d slept fitfully, wakened when Emily and Kasumi came back inside, listened to them whisper for a minute, and then tried really hard not to speculate on what the silence that had fallen meant. I’d woken up again a couple of times to silence, but hadn’t let myself get up. I must have fallen asleep for real at some point, because I didn’t remember Hancock and the girls leaving. I wondered if he’d said anything to them about the kiss. And where was he now? Surely he didn’t subscribe to all that superstitious nonsense about it being bad luck to see the bride before the ceremony. He wouldn’t even know about it, not if he didn’t know what the standard wedding vows were.

As I headed for the water, I suddenly heard Kasumi’s voice, and froze. I didn’t quite flatten myself against the wall to eavesdrop more effectively, but I didn’t turn the corner and say hi, either. 

“--your mom made me make that holotape.”

“You told them where you are?”

“No. I didn’t-- I mean, it’s not that I don’t _trust_ them, I get it, it’s like that Deacon guy said, either they’re my real parents or they love me anyway. I just-- kind of like being somewhere they don’t know where I am, for once. Does that make me horrible?”

“You’re not horrible. Did you tell them you’re safe?”

“And that I’d see them soon. I mean, whoever your mom sent up there with the holotape might have told them more. I just-- it’s amazing being here with you, don’t get me wrong, I’m not wishing our time away. But it’s still driving me crazy, the not knowing.”

“When you do find out?”

“I’ll somehow magically know what I want to do? I don’t-- oh, Emily, look, over here!”

“What? What is that?”

Their voices receded. I headed on towards the water, feeling like a spy. This was the first conversation I’d ever heard Emily having where I wasn’t sure she’d be happy to have me interrupt. Milestones were just popping out at me all over the place lately.

Once I reached the water, I plunged-- fully clothed, since I didn’t feel like giving Sheng Kowalski a show-- below the surface, and rinsed myself off as thoroughly as I could. It probably took more than nine minutes, but I wasn’t scared of Piper, at least not when she wasn’t standing right there. Then I climbed out, shook myself off, pulled my boots back on, and dripped my way back towards Home Plate. 

Piper was reading an old issue of _Live and Love_ I’d left on the coffee table when I squelched back through the door, locked it behind me, and started peeling off my wet things.

“Blue, this is all so sudden,” she said, fanning herself with the magazine, as I hung my wet top over the workbench and stepped out of my pants. “But I guess we did miss our chance at a drunken bachelerotte party, so--”

“You know I love you, Pipes, but not like that,” I said, with the purple dress in my hand, climbing the stairs to the dresser where I kept clean clothes so I could get into dry underwear. “Although, speaking of girls who like girls like that--”

“Kasumi and Emily, huh?” said Piper. “I did kinda wonder. All that giggling and holding hands. Well, good for Emily. They’ve got to grow up sometime, you know.”

“Do they?” I asked, shaking off a little more before I pulled the purple dress over my head and smoothed the scrunchy fabric down over my hips. 

The dress clung to me, but at this point in my life-- more than three years, subjectively, since my only pregnancy, and on a diet of whatever I could scrounge, with regular exercise in the form of fighting for my life on a more-or-less-daily basis-- it didn’t seem to be under any undue strain. It came most of the way down to my knees, over thighs that weren’t slender, like the thighs I’d once longed for and been convinced I could achieve with enough exercise and self-discipline. They were hard and muscular, thick enough to carry me cross-country. Functional legs. It was hard to look at them in a dress without thinking _category error_.

It didn’t help that I was being swarmed with memories, not incidents so much as images and feelings: full-length mirrors, department store dressing rooms, pantyhose, high heels, holiday parties, work; Nate zipping me up at the back; Nate telling me I looked great, that the black sandals went better than the tan ones, that nobody expected me to have lost the baby weight yet.

My old life, my old self. My late husband. _Late_ , as if he’d overslept and missed the last train, and that was why he wasn’t with me now.

“Blue,” said Piper, her voice uncharacteristically soft and tentative. “What’s wrong?”

I took a deep breath, smoothing the glimmering fabric of the dress down towards my knees, one more time. 

“It’s gorgeous,” I said. “Did you bring me shoes?”

Piper clapped her hands. “Did I bring you shoes? Blue, what do you take me for?”

…………………………………………………………………………..

Either my willpower had taken a nosedive or Piper was running on some really high-octane enthusiasm, because she talked me out of changing into something more reasonable to go get my hair done, “so John can see what your hair needs to go with.” I felt about a hundred times more self-conscious walking from Home Plate to the barber shop in a purple sparkly dress thing and pumps-- _pumps_ , with a _heel_ , and a little tiny _buckle_ \-- than I had walking back from the water’s edge soaking wet, and I did attract a couple of calls and whistles from passersby, but Piper yelled at them, “It’s her wedding day, you jerks!” and they yelled back, “Hey, congratulations!”

John had just finished combing out my still-damp hair, and was still congratulating me, when I heard, above the general noise, a voice that I was pretty sure was Kasumi’s yelling, “Security!”

I got there at the same time as two security guards, quick enough to see that Myrna-- that fucking _bitch_ , I should have known-- had Emily backed up against a wall, a finger jabbing at her chest, actually _touching_ her.

My first instinct was to calculate speed and trajectory, hit Myrna with a flying tackle, get my knee on her chest and my hand around her throat, if not hard enough to bruise, at least hard enough to seriously scare her. It wasn’t the dress that stopped me, or not completely, although maybe the unfamiliar sensation of my body in a dress-- and _pumps_ \-- made me hesitate long enough to think about it instead of just automatically launching my body like a grenade across the space between us.

Myrna was wearing a gun at her hip, but she hadn’t drawn it.

Emily’s gaze had just alighted on me, and she was smiling.

One of the security guards-- I was pretty sure his name was Vince-- was saying, “Stand down, Myrna. The synth isn’t bothering anyone.”

_You’ve got to stop thinking of everyplace you don’t personally run as enemy territory._

I hadn’t always thought that way, and I’d thought of it as one of the harsh but necessary lessons I’d learned since being defrosted-- lessons along the same lines as _your husband is gone forever, your baby is gone forever, everything you ever loved in life is gone forever_ , and _roaches are now the size of Yorkshire terriers_. But there were other things I’d learned, weren’t there-- ones that didn’t make me wish I’d never signed the papers to get inside that fucking vault. Because if I hadn’t--

I crossed-- quickly, a little clumsily in the unfamiliar shoes-- to Emily; by the time I got there, Myrna had lowered her hand and backed up a step. I took Emily in my arms, and she said in my ear, “Mother, you look so _pretty_!”

I held her away from me at arms’ length. “You all right?”

She nodded, still smiling. I turned to Myrna.

“Don’t you ever touch my daughter again,” I said, and my voice was calmer than I expected. “ _Ever_.”

“It’s not your _daughter_ ,” said Myrna, furiously. “It’s not even _human_.”

“That’s enough, Myrna,” said Vince. “Nora’s got just as much right to bring her synth here as you have to keep your Mister Handy.”

I spun around to look at him, but as I opened my mouth, I heard Piper say from behind me, “And now we know you can sprint in those shoes! Bonus! Nice yelling, Kasumi.”

“Thanks,” said Kasumi modestly.

“I knew you were trouble the first time you walked through these gates, Bowman,” said Myrna. “As for you, Kasumi Nakano, your father would be _ashamed_ of you if he could see the company you’re keeping. A decent girl from a decent family walking around hand in hand with this, this _thing_ , this _creature_ \--”

She broke off, choking now with rage, as Kasumi dispassionately raised her hand and stuck up her middle finger.

“Fuck off, crazy,” she said, and turned to me. “Ms. Bowman, you look really pretty. You should go ahead and get your hair fixed the rest of the way. Emily and I will be fine.”

“You’re good, Nora,” said Vince. “We’ve got things under control. Congratulations, by the way.”

……………………………………………..

I did get my hair fixed the rest of the way, and as John did things to it, I heard Travis’ voice from the nearby radio saying, “Hey, I’ve gotten word that Nora Bowman’s wedding to Mayor Hancock of Goodneighbor is set to take place at the All Faiths Chapel sometime today. If you see either one of them walking around, make sure you say congratulations and best wishes and all that jazz. This one goes out to them.”

[The song started to play](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2JnDKvuNzw), and I laughed, and John said, “Shit! Hold still!”

By the time I was dolled up to Piper’s satisfaction-- I refused to even consider lipstick, and she finally quit arguing when I threatened to take the dress and shoes back off and stick my head under the nearest water pump-- I was seriously starting to wonder why I hadn’t seen Hancock yet. 

“Do you think he’s getting drunk in the Dugout or something?” I asked, and Piper said, “I dunno, Blue. You want me to go look for him?”

“I mean, I’m ready to get married when he is,” I said. “If that’s not sometime in the next half an hour, I should probably take this dress back off before I ruin it.”

“I’ll go check the bars and dives and dens of iniquity,” said Piper. “You go find Emily and see if she’s got a dress picked out yet.”

I found Emily in Fallon’s Basement, where she was debating between two dresses; I agreed with Kasumi that the green one was the most becoming, and she bought it. Kasumi was still wearing her jumpsuit, and declined my offer to buy her something new.

“Thanks anyway,” she said, “but I already owe you a lot, Ms. Bowman. And I’ve got more clothes at home-- I just didn’t bring them along. I didn’t know there was going to be a wedding. When _is_ the wedding, by the way?”

“I dunno,” I said, and checked my Pip-Boy; it was already after two. “Maybe he was thinking evening, and went off for a walk or something.” I didn’t like to think of myself as clingy or smothering, but it was hard for me not to feel a little taken aback that he would go missing-- well, not _missing_ , but _somewhere_ , away from me-- today of all days. Was he having second thoughts? Was the whole stepfather thing overwhelming him? Had he woken up this morning with proposer’s remorse? Maybe this was why engagements were usually longer than one night-- to give people time to ride out the complicated feelings such a gigantic commitment was bound to inspire, before they were actually expected to stand up in front of people and say words like _till death do us part._

I told myself not to be silly. We’d never been ones to stick to a strict schedule, and anyway, there wasn’t a time we’d set that he was late for. Just because today was the day we’d picked to publicly celebrate a lifelong commitment to each other didn’t mean he had to be at my side every second.

“Because if it’s going to be a little while, I could eat,” said Kasumi, and Emily said, “Oh, me too!”

“Let’s get some noodle bowls,” I said. “And eat them very, very carefully.”

“Or change first,” Emily suggested.

“Fine.”

By the time we’d changed, and eaten, and changed back, it was after three, and I still hadn’t seen either Hancock or-- since she took off to look for him-- Piper.

“Let’s go sit on the park bench by the chapel,” Emily suggested. “That way he’ll be sure to find us when he’s ready.”

“Great,” I said. “Then we can have a montage of the shadows lengthening and the streetlights coming on as I slowly realize he’s not coming after all.”

Emily laughed, and Kasumi said, “‘Montage’?”

“Oh, never mind,” I said, and we did go to the bench and sit down. Emily sat in the middle, and I saw that she was holding hands with Kasumi again. She saw me see, and blushed, and gave me a shy little smile. I smiled back.

“You look so pretty,” I told her. 

“So do you,” she said. “I wonder what Hancock is going to wear?”

“His frock coat, I imagine,” I said. “A wedding is one of the places it’s actually an appropriate level of formality. What the-- what kid is that, yelling? It sounded almost like--”

“ _Mom!_ ” I heard again, and then footsteps clanging down the stairs behind me, and I turned around, and then wobbled to my feet in the bizarre things I was wearing instead of real shoes, as Shaun did what he hadn’t done in ages, launched himself into the air at me, and I caught him, stumbled a couple of steps and almost threw my back out but didn’t fall, clutched him in my arms as he said, “Best-wishes-for-your-future-happiness, Mom, your hair is all fancy, we’re all here--”

I looked up over his head at X9-21, dressed in his now-habitual green shirt and jeans, walking calmly side by side with Max, whose already large eyes were huge as he took in the city, and behind them, six or eight Minutemen carrying laser muskets, and behind them--

I put Shaun down and ran, in my crazy shoes, to Hancock, who said, “Don’t kill me-- I made sure we had plenty of backup in case we got ambushed, but-- I didn’t want your kids to miss--”

I interrupted him with a kiss, and then said, “You left me here-- trying on _dresses_ , getting my _hair_ done-- if you think that just because we’re getting married I’m going to turn into some, some stay-at-home trophy wife--”

“God, you look so fucking gorgeous,” he said. “OK, OK, wrong moment-- Nora, I don’t want you to turn into anything. Don’t be mad. I didn't want you to worry, and I figured one of us should stay here with the girls, and I wanted to-- give you something.”

“You didn’t have to give me anything but that ring,” I said, “and let's not make a habit out of trying to spare each other worry, but-- thank you. God, thank you, love, I love you so-- c’mere, X9-21, c’mere, Max, we’re going to have a goddamn family hug, Shaun, Emily, everybody, come on, X9, you’ve graduated to group hugging--”

“Are we having a wedding today, or what?” demanded Piper, trotting up as I tried to get my pathetically inadequate arms around five people at once. “Yes, I knew where he was all along, I _can_ keep a secret, as long as I vanish as soon as you start getting suspicious. You weren’t really worried, were you, Blue? It’s _Hancock_.”

“Why didn’t you just let me sleep in later?” I demanded, and she said, “I thought it would take longer to get you into a dress. Hi, Reverend!” she added, as the pastor emerged from the chapel, clearly poised to shush us. “The gang’s all here, should we get started?”


	9. so when they ask how far love goes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ([Dar Williams, "The One Who Knows"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8P-8B39pMg))

The actual wedding itself took about five minutes, not counting the shuffle to get us into position on the city steps so that everybody could see-- _everybody_ counting the crowd that had just arrived and the second crowd that immediately gathered to see the first crowd. Nick arrived on Piper’s heels, and pushed his way to the front, with Shaun, Emily, Max, X9-21, Kasumi, Hancock, the pastor, and me. Everybody else-- Minutemen and Diamond city gawkers alike-- crowded around, commenting, and the pastor didn’t wait for them to be quiet before he asked us if we were ready.

“Almost,” I said, and wiggled and tugged Nate’s ring from my wedding finger, my left fourth finger. I held it in my hand for a second before I slid it onto my right fourth finger instead.

“You don’t have to do that,” said Hancock, watching me. “I’ll be the other hand.”

“Hush,” I said, and looked at the pastor. “Ready.”

The words he said weren’t exactly the same as the ones I’d quoted to Hancock, but they weren’t too different. More flashbacks. The little garden out beside the church, the priest in her white robe and hand-woven, rainbow-colored Guatemalan stole, the weight of my long, long hair pulling my head back, Nate’s thumbs caressing mine when we were told to join hands.

Now, instead of clean-cut, dress-blues Nate and long-haired, soft-bodied me, I was standing, shorn and taut, opposite-- well, a ghoul. 

His face and body were withered and warped, his eyes were a weird glassy black and his nose was missing entirely. If the Nora who’d married Nate had seen him, maybe she wouldn’t have screamed out loud-- she’d been a nice girl, kind and considerate, and it was obvious he was sentient, with feelings to be hurt-- but she would have been hard pressed not to shiver a little, with pity and revulsion.

But I wasn’t that girl anymore. I’d seen thousands of worse things, starting with a stranger putting a bullet in my husband’s head and walking off with my baby. I remembered that girl I’d been, but so much of what she was had been worn away, ripped away, burned away, or poured out onto what turned out to be stony, fruitless ground. 

And it was Hancock who’d saved my life (more times than I could count, now), saved my sanity (when everything I’d been searching and surviving and getting tough and strong and fast and scary for turned out to be hopelessly gone, and I was left with radioactive ash and dust), given me something to live for, something to be strong for, and held me at the moments when the last of my strength deserted me. 

I took his hands, although the pastor hadn’t instructed us to join them, and he squeezed mine hard.

The pastor asked if he had the ring.

“Yeah,” he said, and fumbled it out of his pocket. “I put it on her now?”

“Yes,” said the pastor, but I pulled my hand back. Hancock and the pastor both looked appalled.

“I can’t believe I forgot this part,” I said. “This is my favorite part. Say, ‘With this ring I thee wed.’”

“With this ring, I thee wed,” Hancock repeated.

“With my body, I thee worship,” I said, looking into his eyes.

He hesitated for a moment before he said, his low, raspy voice lower than usual, “With my body, I thee worship.”

I offered him my outstretched fingers, and he slid the ring on-- it was only a little too loose, which was better than the alternative; I’d have to resize it at the workshop, so it wouldn’t slip off, but it would do for now-- and the pastor said, a little testily, “Anything else you’d like to add, Ms. Bowman?”

“No,” I said. “That was it.”

“Then by the power vested in me by God and the All Faiths Chapel of Diamond City,” he said, “I now pronounce you husband and wife.”

I’d forgotten anyone else was there, and the cheers that broke out startled me so much I screamed a little, and Hancock laughed, took me in his arms, and kissed me long enough for me to forget again.

………………………………………………………………….

After that, the crowd got noisy again, and it didn't seem to have any plans to disperse; I saw the Bobrov brothers and Scarlett setting up tables with food and booze on them, and empty mason jars that people quickly started filling with caps. Piper’s sister Nat seemed to have organized a few other kids to arrive from all directions with radios, which they placed strategically around the perimeter of the open space between the chapel and the Publick Occurrences building, and turned up; Travis’ voice said, “I’ve just been informed by my most reliable source that the unexpected social event of the season is now in full swing. For those who would care to dance, I’ll be here all afternoon and into the evening, bringing you the most romantic music you’ll hear on any station in the Commonwealth. Definitely more romantic than those violins on Radio Freedom all the time, am I right, General? Why don’t you have your Minutemen mix it up sometime, with something like _this_?”

I laughed, as the music started, and sat down on the steps in my fancy dress. Shaun, who didn’t sit on my lap much anymore, plunked down in my lap; I wrapped my arms around his waist like a seatbelt. Emily and Hancock sat down on either side of me; Kasumi sat next to Emily, and Piper sat a step below her. Nick whirred down next to Hancock. Max and X9-21 looked at each other, and stayed standing. 

“Well, it wasn’t much to drag you guys all the way over here for,” I said.

“It was cool,” said Shaun, “but why couldn’t we do it at home?”

I kissed the side of his head. “Because we don’t have a pastor at home.”

“Why not?”

“Good point,” I said. “We really should have one on hand. I’ll have to look into that. Somebody else at the Castle is bound to want to get married sometime. Kind of surprised they haven’t already, to be honest.”

“What about Hancock?” Nick asked.

I turned to look at him. “Uh, that’s why we’re all gathered here today. Hancock’s taken.”

“What about Hancock as the officiant?” Nick clarified. “Didn’t you ever marry anybody back in Goodneighbor?”

“You calling me a bigamist?” Hancock asked, and Nick, whose yellow eyes didn’t really roll per se, flicked them sideways instead. “Guess the good folk of Goodneighbor ain’t too keen on monogamy, cause no, can’t say as I’ve ever been called on-- I mean, it ain’t like I ever got a handbook on what the mayor can and can’t do, either. Mostly I just tried stuff, and then if nobody stabbed me about it, I figured the mayor could do it.” 

“Yeah, that’s pretty much how I’ve approached being the general of the Minutemen,” I said. “And nobody’s stabbed me yet! Well, no Minutemen, anyway. You want to be in charge of marrying people at the Castle?”

“Except I’m not the mayor of the Castle,” he said.

I shrugged. “You’re the only one we’ve got.”

“I think _you’re_ the closest thing we got,” he said. “You could give marrying people a try. See if anybody stabs you.”

Emily moved slightly against me, a tiny startled twitch, and when I glanced at her, I saw that Kasumi had pulled the ribbon off the end of her braid and was unbraiding it, combing nimble fingers through the waves of Emily’s hair. It seemed like a shockingly intimate gesture-- not sexual, but tender, even a little bit possessive. Emily was looking down at her lap, sitting very still.

“You don’t mind, do you?” Kasumi asked her softly. “Your hair’s so pretty.”

“I don’t mind,” said Emily, even more softly, without looking up. 

Hancock put his hand on my knee. “How about it, Mrs. Mayor? Feel like dancing?”

“Sure, Mr. General,” I said, and he grimaced. “See how dumb that is? Yeah, let’s dance.”

…………………………………..

 

Hancock and I had never danced together before, and it turned out he was _fantastic_.

“Where did you learn to dance like this?” I demanded as he swung me out to arm’s length, then pulled me back in, cradling my back to his chest. 

“Magnolia,” he said. “Tried to teach me to sing, too, but no dice there.”

Emily and Kasumi were dancing, too, gigglingly and close; Piper was dancing with Shaun, and Nick had claimed Nat. I could suddenly understand why people had big weddings that they planned a year in advance; there were too many people who weren’t here. Curie, Preston, Fahrenheit, Macready--

“We need to take this wedding on tour,” I told Hancock, who replied by picking me up and swinging me around till my legs spun out and I probably gave the entirety of Diamond City a panty shot. 

“We can get married in every town, settlement, vault and deathclaw nest in the Commonwealth,” he said, setting me down. “Say the word.”

“Honeymoon,” I said, trying to catch my breath. “After we get back to the Castle, talk to Deacon and get Kasumi settled-- wedding trip, yeah? Vacation?”

“Hey, I’m always up for a vacation,” he said. “You’re the one that never turns that radio off.”

The song ended, and I said, “Dance with Emily next, OK? Father-daughter?”

“Which son you going to dance with?” Hancock asked, and I glanced around; Shaun and Nat were talking, seriously, head to head. Scarlett had claimed Max, who looked equal parts terrified and thrilled. X9-21 was sitting on the bench where Hancock had proposed the night before, watching.

“I might just sit this one out,” I told Hancock, who nodded, tracking my gaze, and then turned towards Emily. I headed over and sat down next to X9.

“Thanks for coming,” I said to him, watching as Emily spun and laughed, hand in hand with Hancock. “I know you’ve never approved of this.”

“It’s not my place to judge your romantic choices, ma’am,” said X9-21. 

“Uh-huh.”

“He approached me, this morning, and requested that I accompany him here, to attend your wedding,” X9 said. “He said that, regardless of my feelings towards himself, he hoped I would agree to come, for your sake. I told him I had never allowed personal feelings to interfere with my duty, and that if he believed you would wish me to be present, I would, of course, attend.”

“Yeah, well, I’m glad,” I said, smiling at him. “It means a lot to me, to have you here.”

He didn’t smile back. “May I ask why?” 

“Because you mean a lot to me, X9-21,” I said. “I mean, you know that, right?”

“I would like to be a valuable asset to you, ma’am,” he said. “But-- you don’t need my protection, and you don’t use me to enforce order or discipline, or send me out to kill your enemies or protect your territories.”

“I thought you were happiest when you could keep an eye on the scientists and the baby,” I said. “But if you want to start going out on Minutemen calls--”

“That’s exactly what I--” X9 broke off abruptly. “I beg your pardon for interrupting you, ma’am.”

“No, go ahead,” I said.

“Someone with my training is not usually given the assignment that will make him _happiest_ ,” he said. “He is not asked whether he _wants_ to be given a particular set of orders.”

“So I’m being too nice to you for your tastes?”

“You require nothing from me,” said X9, “and so I can be worth nothing to you.” 

I didn’t answer for a moment. I would have been horrified-- I _was_ , anyway, a little-- except that I’d suddenly recognized the conversation we were having. It was a conversation I’d had before, in fact, multiple times, and this was one of the less intense forms of it I’d had. I doubted anything would ever top the one where half the conversation had consisted of silent hiding and spying, and the other half-- my half-- had consisted of running around, crying, screaming, interrogating, tracking, fighting, killing, almost dying, digging around in not one but two still-warm brains for helpful tech, building a makeshift teleporter out of desk fans and typewriter innards, crossing my fingers, and disintegrating myself.

_What am I worth to you?_

“C’mere,” I said, standing up, and holding out my hands to X9-21. “Dance with me.”

He didn’t move. “I don’t know how to dance, ma’am.”

“It’s easy,” I said. “Stand up.”

He stood.

“Put your hand on my shoulder,” I said. 

He did.

“Now put your other hand on my waist.”

“This seems inappropriate,” he said as he obeyed.

“It would be inappropriate if you put your hand on my ass,” I said. “This is completely appropriate. Look, there’s room in between us for Jesus.”

“Who?”

“Never mind,” I said. “Now we just kind of-- move our feet to the music, and sway.”

He began to move, stiffly. “I apologize in advance for stepping on your feet.”

“I apologize in advance for kicking you in the shins if you do. These shoes are about a nanometer thick.”

“Then it shouldn’t hurt too much if you kick me in the shins, ma’am.”

“Good point,” I said, as we stepped and swayed, carefully, hands on each other’s shoulders and waists. “How old are you, X9-21? I’ve never asked you how old you are.”

He looked at me quizzically. “I was created fifteen years ago, ma’am.”

“So you didn’t know Shaun as a baby.”

“No, ma’am.”

“But you know Naveena.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“So you can imagine what Shaun was like, the last time I saw him before the Institute took him,” I said. “I’d try to send him out to kill my enemies and protect my territories, and he’d just pull my hair and spit up.”

X9 didn’t answer for awhile, as we continued to sway. 

Then he said, “Once we were told who you were, and all that you’d done to reach him, I found it-- difficult to understand. If he wanted to meet you, why hadn’t he simply sent one of us to the vault? We could have relayed you directly into the Institute. You would have been safe. And you would never have made contact with-- subversive influences.”

“It wouldn’t have made any difference,” I said. “Not in the end. I mean, it wasn’t because of what I’d seen and heard up here, or because the Railroad brainwashed me, or because I was mad at him, that he didn’t take good enough care of me. It was when he told me about why they’d taken him, about how the synths had been created, and then-- I mean, I loved him, X9, right up to the very end I loved him, but he wasn’t the only one, I couldn’t pretend he was, it wasn’t right for him to ask that of me, that I choose him over-- you.”

He frowned. “Me?”

“All of you,” I said. “The synths. My children. But yeah, you, X9-21. Even if I hadn’t met you yet, then.”

He was silent, as we kept moving, slowly, together.

“Look,” I said, after a minute. “I’m not trying to get all mushy on you, X9. I know you don’t like that. But you asked why I’m glad you’re here at my wedding. Well, it’s because I love you. You’re mine, and I love you. So there.”

We swayed for another moment before he suddenly pulled me against him, hard, the muscles of his arms crushing the air out of my lungs, and held me that way until my head swam from lack of oxygen and I started to struggle. When I did, he let go just as suddenly.

“I apologize, ma’am,” he said. “Did I cause you discomfort?”

“Good hug,” I said, when I could catch my breath again. “Best hug yet.”

……………………………………………………………………..

I danced with Shaun next-- he asked me a lot of questions about the wedding, and then about my wedding to Nate, and then about who had married people to each other in the Institute, which I didn’t know, but resolved to find out. Then I danced with Max, who said almost nothing, except “Congratulations,” and a few yes-ma’am’s and no-ma’ams, and then Emily, who put her head down on my shoulder and let me sway her back and forth without speaking at all. Then Nick-- we talked briefly about Acadia, I told him I’d get back to him after I’d spoken to Deacon-- and then Piper, who said, “I get to write this whole thing up, right?”

“Right, Wright,” I said, and she groaned and elbowed me.

“Don’t elbow me when I’m wearing a dress,” I said. “I miss my body armor.”

The sun was lowering in the sky. The crowd had thinned, then passed the tipping point and become a gathering. Emily and Kasumi were slow-dancing, Emily’s face dreamy and happy over Kasumi’s shoulder, her hair falling in loose waves down her back. As the song ended, she straightened up and ran her fingers through her hair with a little sigh, pushing it back.

Petunia came up to me and asked if the Minutemen should take Shaun back home now. “Or do you want him to spend the night?”

“Let’s all go home now,” I said. “I miss home. And what if it gets attacked while we’re here?”

“We left enough people there to defend it,” said Petunia. “We’re not dumb, General. But if you want to get home, we can get you home tonight.”

“I thought we were going to stay here another night,” Emily protested.

I sighed. “I just-- I mean, if you really want to, of course. We can--”

“Excuse me, ma’am,” said X9-21, stepped past me, and picked Emily up, slinging her over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. Emily shrieked, then started laughing; when she did, Kasumi laughed too. 

X9-21 looked at me, his face perfectly serious, and said, “We’re ready to go when you are.”

“What are you doing?” Emily cried, breathless with laughter. “Put me down!”

“Quiet,” said X9-21. “Our mother has indulged you long enough. She’s tired, and she would like to take us home.”

I couldn’t speak for a moment. _Our mother._ He’d never said it before.

“You can’t carry her all the way to the Castle like that,” was what I finally managed, and X9 said, “I can do my best, ma’am.”

“ _Mother_!”

“All right, X9, put her down,” I said, and he obeyed immediately. Emily’s face was scarlet, and she was still giggling when she said, “ _Not_ funny!”

“Not funny,” X9 agreed gravely. “Utilitarian.”

“Pick _me_ up, X9-21,” said Shaun, and X9 obligingly hoisted Shaun to his shoulders. Max was watching the whole thing, his mouth hanging slightly open.

“I have to _pack_ ,” said Emily, straightening her dress. “I have to change. I need my gun and my knife and my real clothes. So do you, mother.”

I nodded. “Are you sure you’re ready?”

Emily glanced at X9-21, and smiled. “I guess I am. We’ve seen a lot. I’d like to come back here sometime, but I guess I’m ready to go home now. If Kasumi is.”

“Yeah,” said Kasumi. “That’s fine. Thanks for the trip, Ms. Bowman. Guess it’s time to get back to reality.”

I don’t think Kasumi noticed-- maybe nobody but a mother would have noticed-- the way Emily’s face changed at that.

The thing about having kids, I’d discovered, was that it was kind of like naming all your most vital organs, then slicing yourself open and setting those organs free to run around and make their own decisions and get themselves in trouble that had nothing to do with you, all the while every knock they took almost killed you. 

But that didn’t take into account the joy of it; there was no simile I could think of for the joy. Even if your heart could sprout wings, fly out of your body, and soar up to the stars, there’d be no comparison.

Hancock’s hand came to rest on my back, and I turned to him, the man who’d kept the blood pumping to my heart all this time, so it didn’t die, so it stayed warm and soft underneath my toughness, so there was something left in me to love with, when my children started coming home to me.

“So,” he said. “You ready to get this show on the road?”

I smiled at him. “Let’s do it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to boomslang for drawing it to my attention that both Nora and Hancock might be considered eligible to perform marriages for others.


	10. yes a heart will always go one step too far

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ([New Pornographers, "Go Places"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBo2qEzyHzE))

I wasn’t used to traveling with such a large group. The Minutemen fanned out around me and my family, creating a perimeter, and I didn’t know what to do with myself, walking without looking around for danger at every second. It was still light out, but the sun was sinking; it would be dark by the time we got home. The sound of people talking around me as we walked was startling: Emily and Kasumi, close together, talking too quietly for me to hear; Minutemen chatting about the city and the wedding.

Hancock and I talked sometimes when we traveled together-- when we had something to say, or when we needed talk-- but neither of us seemed to need it right now. I turned the ring on my finger, thinking of Curie, keeping it all this time, and then giving it to Hancock to give to me. Curie, the sweet, brilliant mind living in the body of one of the daughters I’d never had a chance to meet. I loved Curie, but it had hurt too much to keep traveling with her, looking at her shyly smiling face, and wondering about G5-19.

“Hey, mom?” Shaun said, trotting up beside me. 

I shook off my reverie. “Yeah, baby?”

“Why don’t I go to school?”

“Well, because there aren’t any other kids at the Castle,” I said. “Except Naveena, and she’s too little to go to school. But all that learning you’ve been doing with Dr. Achanta, that’s kind of like going to school, right?”

“Yeah but I wish there were other kids there,” said Shaun. “I kind of miss school.”

“What do you mean, you miss it?” I asked. “You’ve never gone to school.”

“Yes I did,” said Shaun. “A long time ago, when I lived in the city.”

I blinked. Shaun hadn’t mentioned Diamond City once since I’d brought him home from the Institute, and I’d just figured those memories had been erased in all the tinkering Advanced Systems had done with him in the interval. 

“I didn’t know you went to school there,” I said, wheels spinning in my head. Kellogg had sent him to school? Should I mention Kellogg? I probably shouldn’t mention Kellogg.

“I liked it,” said Shaun. “There were other kids, and we’d talk about what we learned, and play games.”

“Did you go to school with Nat?” I asked curiously.

“She was in a different class,” he said. “She said she remembers seeing me though. She said if I came back maybe we’d be in the same class. She asked me how old I am, and I couldn’t remember. How old am I?”

“To be honest with you, baby, I don’t know either,” I said. “But you look about the right age to be friends with Nat. Just like I look about the right age to be friends with Piper, even though I’m really--”

“Two hundred and forty,” said Shaun, laughing; that was a joke that never seemed to get old. “Can I come back here and go to school sometime?”

“Uh, if you really want to, we can talk about it,” I said. “Later, OK? If you think about it for awhile and decide it’s something you’d really like to do sometime, we’ll talk about it, OK?”

“OK,” said Shaun, and fell silent.

Not long after, he stumbled, and before I could move, X9-21 scooped him up, cradling him against his broad chest.

“I’m not tired,” said Shaun, and then, more or less immediately, fell asleep with his head on X9’s shoulder.

“We can take turns carrying him,” I said softly to X9. “Let me know when you get tired.”

He smiled at me, the quick, crooked, vanishing smile that always seemed to take him by surprise.

“I’ll let you know, ma’am,” he said, but when we arrived home in the twilight, hours later, he was still carrying Shaun.

…………………………………………………..

Deacon arrived at the Castle early the next morning. Emily was the first to spot him, and came running to call me and Hancock out of bed, where we’d been lingering a little. Last night _had_ been our wedding night, after all. 

“That asshole,” Hancock muttered, sliding his arms into the sleeves of his frock coat. “He knows goddamn well we were up late.”

Before I could say anything to Emily, she’d run back off, and Hancock and I met her in the courtyard, where she stood, tense and still, with Kasumi.

“Hail, hail, the gang’s all here,” Deacon called cheerfully as he approached. “Except my favorite. Where’s my favorite? Why isn't he here? Is he mad at me? Is this about the time I kept him up all night talking? Should I have brought flowers? I should've brought flowers. Or a bottle of wine. Hey, can I borrow a bottle of wine real quick?”

"I'll go find Max for you in a second, Deacon," I said. "But first, do you have news for us?"

"I have lack of news," said Deacon. "Which is kind of like news if you think about it. Specifically, I have no Kasumi Nakano fake identity on file, and no Rei and Kenji Nakano listed as Railroad contacts.”

“Well,” said Kasumi. “That answers that, I guess. Uh, thanks, Mr. Deacon.”

“Just call me Deacon, all right?” said Deacon. “You’re welcome. Totally worth it to have the Supreme Leader of the Minutemen owe me one. By the way, General, well played on the hand-in-marriage thing. Curses, foiled again, et cetera.”

“Thanks,” I said, eyes on Emily, whose eyes were on Kasumi. Kasumi was looking at no one in particular, her expression thoughtful. “Kasumi, hon, did you want to-- did you want some time, to think about what’s next?”

“I mean,” said Kasumi, “I guess I know what’s next. I guess I go home, right? If I’m really my parents’ daughter, then-- I need to-- God, I need to-- catch up with them. It's been so long since I-- since they knew what I was thinking.”

She looked up at me, and then at Emily, whose expression was as carefully blank as I'd ever seen it. Maybe more.

"Emily," she said softly. "I-- will you-- will you come help me get ready?"

She reached out and took Emily’s hand; Emily didn't resist. The two of them moved towards the nearest archway, Kasumi speaking now too quietly for me to hear.

“Will you tell Max I'm sorry and I just want one more chance?" Deacon called after them, but neither of them answered or looked back. Deacon raised his eyebrows at me. "Wrong time for jokes?"

“They kind of-- bonded,” I said, wrenching my attention from the two of them (they deserved privacy; if Emily needed me, she’d let me know) to the next thing I needed to ask Deacon. “Hey, have you ever heard of a place called Acadia?” 

Deacon’s face got the noncommittal look that it got when he didn’t know what the hell somebody was talking about. Unfortunately, it was also the look he got when he did know what somebody was talking about but didn’t want to let on for whatever reason, or when he realized somebody didn’t know something he did know, or that somebody did know something he didn’t know but was interested in knowing. It was a look I saw on Deacon’s face quite a lot, actually, and it was pretty annoying.

“Acadia,” he repeated.

“Yeah,” I said. “Acadia. Ever heard of it?”

Deacon cocked his head. “You mean before right now?”

“Deacon, it’s a very simple question, and if you don’t answer me I’m going to--”

“What’re you gonna do?” Deacon asked, grinning.

I had a sudden stroke of inspiration. “I’m going to tell Desdemona you and I slept together.”

“What?” said Deacon, taken aback. “Uh-- no we didn’t.”

“Yeah, well, who’s Desdemona going to believe?” 

“Me!” said Deacon. 

“Because you’re so trustworthy?”

“Because that’s crazy!” said Deacon.

I batted my eyes at him. “Is it?”

_“Yes!”_

“Maybe so,” I said, “but you’re just so charming and persuasive, you swept me off my feet, and now I don’t know _what_ to do. I mean, if Hancock finds out, he’ll probably demand I quit the Railroad.”

“Goddamn right,” put in Hancock. “You scoundrel, you, seducing my wife like that. I always knew you were a bad influence on her.”

“Oh, Deacon,” I said sadly. “How could we be so foolish and impulsive? How could we risk destabilizing the whole Railroad, everything Desdemona has worked so hard for, just for one torrid night of passion--”

“Jesus,” said Deacon. “I really _am_ a bad influence. All right, all right. Acadia. Never heard of it, no, and that’s the God’s honest truth. Should I have?”

“I’m not sure,” I said, and gave him a brief summary of what Kasumi had told us at the Dugout.

“A whole town of runaway synths?” said Deacon, when I was finished. “Yeah, _that_ sounds like the story somebody spins you when they want you to come alone and tell nobody and never be seen again because it’s just so great and safe in their murder house, I mean magical synth haven.”

“It does, doesn't it,” I said. “I was hoping it was a real thing, but if the Railroad doesn't know about it-- but, Deacon, who’d be targeting synths like that? The Brotherhood never had a presence that far north, did they?”

“They might be freelance synth-haters,” said Deacon. “Or they might just be picking on synths because they’re looking for people who are desperate and/or alone, and a lot of synths fit the bill. Either way, sounds like something the Railroad needs to check out. I’ll head back to Des, see who she can spare for a trip north.”

“No,” I said. “I mean, tell Des if you want, but I’m going to check this out myself. If someone’s really up there victimizing synths--”

“You don’t trust anybody else to kill them dead enough?”

I nodded. “Pretty much.”

“I knew that whole post-wedding vacation idea was a crock,” said Hancock. “You’re a workaholic, you know that?”

“I’m not saying let’s not do that at all,” I said. “I’d just like to postpone it until after we check out whoever’s luring a bunch of my more scared and friendless relatives to parts unknown for reasons unknown.”

“Well,” said Hancock. “When you put it like that.”

“Hey!” Deacon said happily, and I saw that Max and X9-21 were approaching us. "There he is. Hey, it's the G-man! G7-to-the-Max! Maximilian, the Million Dollar Synth!"

Max smiled. "Hello again, Mr. Deacon."

" _Deacon_ ," said Deacon. "It's not a name, it's a lifestyle. Hey, you know, Max, the General here is about to leave town for awhile. If you don't feel like hanging out here with a courser and a bunch of Institute scientists, you and I could hit the road. I could introduce you to some folks you might like. Friends of Glory. You know, that's not a bad codename for a secret op. The Friends of Glory. 'Are you a friend of Glory?' 'Glory in excelsis Deo.' What do you think, Max? You and me. Deacon and codename-Excelsis. Oh, shit, that's actually a really good codename. I probably shouldn't have said it in front of the courser, huh?"

"I am not a courser," said X9-21.

Deacon raised his eyebrows. 

"Yeah, those ex-Institute dickholes whose lives he'd been busting his ass to save demoted him or defrocked him or something," I said. "Also, I asked you to be cool."

"I am cool," said Deacon. "This is me being cool. Look at my shades. Think about it, Max. Wouldn't have to be forever, just till the bosslady gets home."

"Where are you going?" X9-21 asked me.

"Way up north, out of the Commonwealth,” I said. "There's this place up there Kasumi told us about, where a lot of runaway synths might be."

“Oh my God,” said Deacon. “Bowman, you are the _least_ secret agent.”

“What?” I said. “I don’t have any secrets from X9-21. He’s part of my family. And he just told you he's not a courser anymore.”

“Ma’am,” said X9-21, “I would like to accompany you on this trip.” 

He was still, very still, facing me, as Deacon said, “Yeah, you should definitely take your friendly neighborhood courser to investigate a bunch of missing synths. Ex-courser. I see no way this could possibly go horribly wrong.”

“I am no longer committed to reclaiming fugitive synths for any purpose Ms. Bowman would find objectionable,” said X9-21. “Ma’am, you’ll be entering unknown territory, and the nature and extent of the dangers you’ll be facing have yet to be determined. Your Minutemen are, collectively, a force to be reckoned with, but I assume that, for practical reasons, you don’t intend to travel with a large group. Individually, I am the most skillful combatant at your disposal, with the possible exception of your husband. Between us, and taking your own abilities into consideration, we should be able to protect you adequately, regardless of what we might encounter.”

“Huh,” said Hancock. “I mean--”

“You’re just flattered that he called you a possible exception,” I told him. “Listen, X9, I really appreciate the offer, but Deacon’s got a point about me showing up at a synth refuge with a courser. It might not be the best way to establish trust.”

“You don’t need to _arrive_ with me,” said X9-21. 

“I should lose you on the way?”

“No, ma’am,” said X9-21, with the faintest suggestion of impatience in his voice. “Once we locate the target area, you can leave me at a base camp or other rendezvous point until you’ve assessed the situation and, if necessary, established trust.”

“By yourself?”

“Yes, ma’am,” said X9, and the corners of his mouth twitched. “You can leave me by myself.”

“But if it’s really dangerous up there-- don’t laugh at me, X9,” I said. “I know you can handle yourself--“

“Handle himself?” said Deacon. “He’s literally a murder machine. Um, no offense.”

There was a pause.

“He didn’t say ‘none taken,’” Deacon said to me. “Should I start running, or--?”

“My apologies, sir,” said X9-21. “I didn’t realize you’d spoken to me. None taken. Ma’am, I strongly advise you to take me along. I assure you that I’ll be an asset to you, not a detriment.”

“That’s not the question,” I said. “You’d be an asset if I left you on the home front, too, to guard the Castle and Emily and Shaun and everybody, while I’m gone. And I’m used to traveling with just Hancock. I know it _might_ be more dangerous up there than we expect, but—“

“Mother,” said X9-21, “ _please_ take me with you.”

“Shit,” said Hancock to Deacon, as I stared at X9-21. “He figured out her reset code. Run _now_.”

…………………………………………………………………….

Emily came up to me as I went through a trunk full of weapons, trying to decide what to take on a trip to God-knows-where, and knelt down on the grass next to a quad-barrel missile launcher. Her eyes were red and swollen, and my heart wrenched sharply at the sight, remembering what she'd said to me on the roof of Home Plate: _I've been feeling like if I’m doing a good enough job at being your daughter, then I’m doing a good enough job in general. At life. At being a person._

I knew what she meant. Her world had gotten bigger. It could be wonderful, having life open up like that, reveal unconsidered possibilities, and it could be terrifying, and usually it was both. She'd given it a try, brave girl that she was, stepped forward towards new possibility, and now it was being snatched away. How could I leave the Commonwealth now, of all times, when she most needed steady, familiar ground under her feet, to reassure her that she was doing fine, that she was valued and loved, that life went on?

I couldn't take her with me. Not even with X9-21 along to defend us. I'd die of a heart attack before we ever found Acadia, if there was even any such place.

“Hey, sweetheart,” I said. “How are you doing?"

“Mother," she said, "I have a favor to ask."

"It's not for me to kill you, is it?" I asked, and she laughed softly. 

"No," she said. "But-- it might be stupid. A bad idea. I think I have a lot of bad ideas."

"You've had a hit parade of good ones, actually," I said. "You're the one who kept us from killing X9-21, and look how well that turned out. And you did that thing in the paper and got Max to come home, and Kasumi to come here instead of taking off into the wilderness-- and, most recently, you dragged us all to Diamond City and got me married. The last bad idea I can think of that you had was the time you decided to run away from the Slog with only your tiny gun and no extra ammo, and even that one was a pretty easy fix."

"But I still don't-- think things through, enough," she said. "I should have thought of this on my own, but I didn't, until Mr. Valentine said something at the wedding. That putting it in the paper that the woman who runs the Minutemen has a daughter-- even apart from me being a synth-- he said, if any raider or Gunner groups have half a brain between them, it's occurred to them that I could be a pretty valuable bargaining chip, if they could get their hands on me. You must have thought of that too, but you didn't say anything."

"Because they're not going to get their hands on you," I said. "That's why we live in a fortress. Well, partly why."

"And when X9 first came here, and you said that about how if he killed you-- I hadn't even thought of that," she said. "And this whole thing with Kasumi-- I _knew_ she was going to go home, but I--" She sniffled a little. "Anyway. Mother?"

"Yes, my darling."

"I want to ask you for something," she said. "But if it's-- stupid, or wrong, or-- just say no to me. Say no, and I won't-- pester."

"It's a deal," I said. "What stupid, wrong thing would you like to ask me for?"

"When Kasumi goes home," she said, "I want to go with her."


	11. can I sail through the changing ocean tides

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ([oh, everybody knows this one, don't they](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WM7-PYtXtJM))

I tried not to pack too heavily for the trip north. My two favorite guns-- Kellogg's pistol and a heavily modded sniper rifle I’d picked up off a particularly hard-to-kill gunner chick-- and a supply of ammo for each. My favorite knife, Pickman's blade, with the fucked-up edge that seemed to slice through anything. Stimpaks. Food. Water. Chems. RadAway and Rad-X. A few bottles of Refreshing Beverage. A few vials of Jack Cabot's freaky serum, which I'd been saving for a rainy day. Maybe it would be rainy up north.

"What do you need to pack?" I asked X9-21, who was kneeling next to me as I dug supplies out of trunks and footlockers, kit bags and packs strewing the ground between us. "What kind of supplies did the Institute give you, for long-term deployments?"

"Two stimpaks, for emergency use," said X9-21. "A personal stealth device, ditto. Ammunition."

"Food? Water?"

"We were expected to obtain our own," said X9-21. "I am a competent hunter and scavenger. What is this?"

He pointed to a Jet Fuel inhaler.

"It's a chem," I said. "A drug. It makes me faster. Well, it enhances my reflexes, I guess. Useful when a lot of enemies are around."

"Is this also a drug?" he asked, looking at an injector of Psychobuff.

"Yeah. That one makes me stronger. And-- madder."

"And this one?" He touched a dose of Fury.

"Also stronger, but that one makes it harder to hold still to aim a gun. So I use it for close quarters, with a knife."

"These all compensate for lack of training," X9 concluded.

"Hey,” I said. “I trained to be a lawyer. Cut me some slack.”

“I’m not denigrating your combat skills, ma’am,” said X9-21. "It would be inappropriate for a human to be subjected to the regimen that created mine. But you have me as a resource. These are an unnecessary encumbrance."

"Yeah, well, nobody's asking you to carry them.”

His eyes had narrowed. “Long-term use of chemical performance enhancers has a deleterious effect on the human body.”

“What are you, an after-school special?” I asked, a little irritably. “I don’t overuse these. They’re for emergencies.”

" _I_ am for emergencies," said X9-21. 

“So, better yet, I have you _and_ the chems.”

He said nothing.

“Look at you, silently disapproving,” I said. “You’re going to silently disapprove every time I use these, aren’t you?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“If I get killed up north because I didn’t have any combat chems on me,” I said, beginning to dump them back into the footlocker where I kept them, “I expect you to explain to Shaun and Emily and the Minutemen that it’s your fault.”

“If you are killed, ma’am,” said X9-21, “I will be unable to explain anything to anyone, because I will be dead already.”

“Mother,” said Emily from behind me, and I looked up. “I just got Kasumi on that short-wave radio she rigged up for me, before she left. She’s home.”

“Great,” I said. “Safe trip?” 

Emily nodded. 

“What did her parents say?”

“They said yes,” said Emily.

“Yes to—“

“To everything,” said Emily.

I nodded. “Well. All right. Great. Then—we’ll leave for Diamond City early tomorrow morning, and then after we check in with Nick and drop Shaun off with Piper, we’ll head up to the Nakanos’. Sound good?”

“Yes, mother,” she said. “Thank you.”

“Good.” I resisted the urge to dig a syringe of Calmex out of the footlocker next to me. “Great. This is a great plan.”  
…………………………………….

The next day, as we were getting ready to leave, Max came up to me.

“Ms. Bowman?” he said. “You don’t mind, do you, me staying here while you’re gone?”

“Of course not,” I said. “I told you, this is your home. But are you sure _you’re_ comfortable? I know Emily’s the familiar face, and she’s--”

“I’ve been out there on my own a long time,” he said. “And nobody ever told me anyplace was my home before. Even the Institute, that wasn’t what you’d call home. If this is really—I mean, it’s not just you, is it? Everybody here acts like Y4—Emily—like she belongs here. And it’s—I’m not used to having people smile at me, but everybody here—“

“Everybody here is glad you’re here,” I said. “And if you change your mind while I’m gone, and decide to travel with Deacon for a bit, you’re still welcome back here any time.”

“Thank you, ma’am,” he said. “It—it means a lot, it really does.”

“It means a lot to me to have you call this place home,” I told him. “I wish I wasn’t rushing right off—I really do want to get to know you better. But when I get home, yeah?”

“It’s a date,” he said, smiling a dazzling smile that made me realize, suddenly, how much he _looked_ like Glory. The same cocoa-colored skin, the same white hair—I’d always assumed Glory bleached hers, but maybe it was natural to their—lot? Line? They had the same first two digits; what did that mean?—and the same gorgeous grin. No wonder Deacon had taken an immediate shine to him. 

“When I get home,” I said again, smiling back at him. “You and me, we’ll talk.”  
…………………………………………………………………….

“I changed my mind,” said Shaun, standing in the doorway of Home Plate. Piper was already in the house, plopping down a suitcase that I suspected was full of the paper she scavenged from all over the Commonwealth. “I don’t want to stay here. I don’t want you to go to Far Harbor. I don’t want Emily to go to Kasumi’s house. Let’s all go home.”

“Oh, sweetheart,” I said, kneeling down to face him. “You’ve got the jitters. I used to get them too, before I went away from home. But then I always had a great time. You’re going to have a great time, too. And if you do change your mind, and want to go home to the Castle, you just tell Piper, and she’ll get you home. OK?”

“But you won’t be there,” said Shaun. “And Emily won’t be there.”

“Baby, you used to stay at the Slog without me all the time, before we even knew Emily,” I said. “Remember?”

“I _hated_ it,” he said. “I hate when you leave and I don’t know if you’re OK and I don’t know when you’re coming home. Emily always tells me you’re fine, and she tells me stories when I can’t sleep or when I have a nightmare—“

“Ms. Wright will do that for you, Shaun,” said Emily softly.

“Sure,” said Piper. “I tell _amazing_ stories. Did your mom ever tell you about the time she and I rescued Amelia Stockton from the dungeon under the river?”

Shaun shook his head, wide-eyed.

“How about what we found in the old witchcraft museum?”

He shook his head again.

“How about the time at the Third Rail when your mom drank six Dirty Wastelanders and ended up—“ 

“See, Shaun,” I said loudly, “Piper will tell you plenty of fun, appropriate stories. And you’ll be having so much fun, and making so many new friends, and learning so much new stuff, that you’ll hardly even notice I’m not there. And I’ll be back soon from Far Harbor, and we’ll all have lots of new stories to tell each other. OK, baby?” 

He nodded. “OK, mom.” 

Emily knelt down, too, to kiss Shaun’s cheek. “Have fun, Shaun. I’ll miss you.”

“You could stay here with me,” he said.

“Don’t pester her,” I said. “She gets to have her own adventure.” I put my arms around him and hugged him. “I love you, baby. Be good for Piper.”

“I love you too,” he said, and grinned as I stood up. “Be good for Hancock and X9-21.”

“Between the two of them, they should keep me in line,” I said, grinning back as Hancock put out his hand and Shaun gave him a high five. “See you later, alligator.”

“After a while, crocodile,” said Emily and Shaun in unison. 

“Can’t believe you even considered taking this trip without me,” said Nick as we rejoined Laurie, Deanna, James, and X9-21 at the gates to the city. “Does the phrase ‘synth detective’ ring any bells? Does a mystery involving missing synths ring any of the same bells?”

“I mean, there’s no client or anything,” I said. “Well, I guess I’m the client. And I can pay you for your time.”

“Don’t insult me, Ms. Bowman,” said Nick. “After you traipsed all over the Commonwealth with me to crack the Eddie Winter case—“

“That was after you traipsed all over the Commonwealth with me to track down Kellogg,” I said. “And got Kellogg’s gross brain all up in your head for me. I think I still owe you a favor or three for that one, Eddie Winter or no.”

“Well, if you feel like tossing a few caps into the old fedora,” said Nick, “Ellie probably wouldn’t mind getting paid for a change.”

“I did slip her a little something before we left,” I said. I’d given her six hundred caps, which Nick would probably think was too much, but which Ellie hadn’t protested over at all—and, of the two of them, Ellie was the one who needed to eat. “God knows how long you’ll be gone this time.”

“I only hope that when I am free,  
As they are free, to go in quest  
Of the knowledge beyond the bounds of life,  
It may not seem better to me to rest,” said Nick.

“What is that?” Emily asked. “Is it a poem? Will you say it again?”

“Robert Frost,” said Nick, and repeated the lines. “You like poetry, Miss Emily?”

She nodded. “I don’t know much, but—I think so. I like that. And one my mother said to me once, about a rainbow.”

“When I get back from Far Harbor,” I said, “I’ll take you to the Boston Public Library. See what kind of poetry they’ve got left.”

“Thank you,” said Emily. “Will you say it one more time, Mr. Valentine? ‘I only hope that when I am free—‘”

………………………………………………………………..

A radstorm was rolling in as we approached the Nakano homestead, which, if I’d believed in omens, would really have bummed me out. I passed the Rad-X bottle around and tried not to believe in omens. A gray cat ran across our path, which seemed kind of ambiguous that way.  
Petunia was kneeling in the dirt outside, patting dirt around a fence post that Jonathan was holding upright for her. They both looked up and smiled when they saw us coming. I saw with pleasure that they already had turrets up, and two guard towers. 

“Hey, General,” Petunia said, when we were close enough, standing up and brushing dirt from her hands onto her already-dirty jeans. “How was the trip?”

“Pleasantly uneventful,” I said. “How was yours?”

“Ran into some mirelurks,” said Petunia. “Mrs. Nakano cooks a mean chowder.”

“Good to know. You two still married?”

“So far, so good,” said Jonathan, grinning. “Thanks, General.”

“Don’t thank me, thank the power vested in me by Preston Garvey,” I said. “And the fact that you finally quit sneaking around kissing each other behind my back and told me what was up.”

They glanced at each other, smiling, as Kasumi’s parents, each of whom looked exactly half like her-- if she had been a Railroad job, she would have been a hell of an impressive one-- came out of the house, and hesitated on the porch.

“Hey, guys,” Petunia called. “This is the General.”

Before either of them could say anything, Kasumi came charging from between them, ran full tilt at us, and flung her arms around Emily, hugging her tightly. Emily closed her eyes as she hugged back, and I saw her breathe in deeply.

I stepped forward past them, towards her parents. 

“Hi,” I said. “Nora Bowman. This is my husband, Hancock, and my son, X9-21. This is our friend, Nick Valentine—and these are your new tenants. Deanna, James, and Laurie.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you all,” said Kasumi’s father politely. Neither of them looked taken aback at the sight of Hancock or Nick, or the sound of X9-21’s name. “Mr. Valentine I know, of course. From the city. I’m Kenji, and this is my wife, Rei. Thank you for looking after our daughter, and for having your people bring her home safely. And I presume the young lady Kasumi is wrapped around is--”

“My daughter,” I said. “Emily.”

“Our guest,” said Rei, smiling.

I nodded. “If you’re sure you’re OK with this.”

“Yes,” said Rei. “We’ve been very much alone up here, and it’s been difficult for Kasumi. We didn’t realize how difficult. And from what Kasumi tells us, and what we read in the paper, Emily seems like a lovely girl.”

“She is,” I said. “She’s the light of my life. She’s also a high-risk proposition. You realize that.”

Kenji nodded. “Hence the added defenses that Ms. Pink and Mr. Silsbee have been building. And hence—“ He nodded towards the other three Minutemen.

“Yeah,” I said. “I know it might seem like overkill, but--“ 

“We brought supplies,” said Deanna. “More building supplies, for whatever new buildings we need to put up, plus weapons, ammo, food, and medicine. And we plan to pull our weight around here. We’re not just Emily’s bodyguards—we’re here to get this place in Minutemen-settlement shape. I mean, no offense, not that you don’t already have a lovely home here, but—“

“But we’ve been very isolated, and very vulnerable,” said Kenji. “Yes. That’s why we agreed to Ms. Bowman’s proposal. Emily is welcome here, as are the rest of you, for the duration of her stay—and longer, if you think you would like to make a permanent home here.”

“Come, dear,” said Rei, and Emily came past me, hand in hand with Kasumi, to stand shyly in front of Rei. “We’re so glad you’re here. And we’ll do everything in our power to make your stay here a pleasant one.”

“Thank you, ma’am,” said Emily softly.

“Thanks again, you guys,” I said to the Minutemen standing by me. “And—sorry, Mr. Nakano—I mean, Kenji—just one more thing. Kasumi said it would be OK if we borrow your boat? I can pay you if you need.”

“That’s not necessary,” said Kenji. “We aren’t using it. And we’ll be pleased to know that whoever tried to lure our daughter north is being brought to justice.”

“I’ll do my best,” I said. “We will, I mean. All four of us. Thanks a lot. For everything. Emily, baby girl, come here. Hugs all around, before we go.”

She let go of Kasumi’s hand and turned to us. Nick stepped forward first, and she looked a little startled, but put her arms around him and hugged him. 

“Thank you for the poem, Mr. Valentine,” she said, and he said, “May it be the first of many.”

Hancock hugged her next, and she stood on tiptoe to kiss him on his cheek, the way she had in Diamond City.

“That’s the nice thing about having this face,” said Hancock. “Nobody kisses you on it unless they mean it. Be good, sunshine. See you soon, all right?”

X9-21 stepped forward gravely. Emily giggled as he put his arms around her, and he smiled, too, but neither spoke.

Last of all, I put my arms around her, breathing her in, and she hugged me, hard, harder than she’d ever hugged me. I wished I could think of a poem to say to her, or at least something articulate and eloquent, but all that came to my mind was my favorite page from a picture book my best friend Leah (hundreds of years dead, now, like all my friends) had given me when Shaun was born. 

_If you become a bird and fly away from me, I will be a tree that you come home to._

“I love you, Emily,” I said.

“I love you, mother.”

 

……………………………………………

“Congratulations,” Nick said, examining the navigation system on the Nakanos’ boat. “You no longer have all your eggs in one basket.”

I blinked away tears. “Yeah. Well. I was actually fine having all my eggs in one really well-defended basket.”

“Diamond City is well-defended,” said Hancock, “and this place is about to be. And this way everybody gets a change of scene, and some new friends, and nobody’s stuck at home worrying about you—well, except Max, and the Castle _is_ a change of scene for him, so _he_ gets a chance to settle in, and the rest of the Castle will look after him. The Nakanos will look after Emily, and if they don’t, or if there’s some big spectacular dust-up with Kasumi, the Minutemen will be here to bail her out. Shaun’ll get his school fun in, and he’ll have Piper and Nat and Diamond City Security to look after _him_. And X9-21, here, will be able to look after _you_.”

X9 smiled bigger at that than I’d ever seen him smile at anything, actually showing his teeth for once. It was a little terrifying. It was more than a little awesome.

“I know, I know,” I said, smiling back at X9. “That’s why I agreed to all these hare-brained ideas in the first place.”

“Nah, you agreed to all these hare-brained ideas because your kids said please,” said Hancock. “But coincidentally, they also weren’t bad ideas.”

“That’s not a coincidence,” I said. “It’s because my kids are awesome, because they have my awesome genes. Now come on, boys. Let’s go kick Far Harbor’s ass.” 

“A ghoul, a human, a discarded prototype synth, and a courser,” said Nick. “If nothing else, we’re likely to bring home some new jokes.”

 

******THE END******

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (...OR IS IT?)
> 
> (Yeah, it is, of this one anyway. Although yes, I am planning a Far Harbor Adventure.)
> 
> Thanks so much to everyone who has commented or left kudos here. It makes me so happy. ♥ you guys.


End file.
